


Tempting Jensen

by hpjk_addict



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Bottom Jensen, Fluff, Forbidden Love, Happy Ending, Insecure Jensen, Jealousy, Light Angst, M/M, Minor Character Death, Older Jared, Regency Romance, Secret Relationship, Secrets, Smut, Supernatural and J2 Big Bang Challenge, Top Jared, Worldly Jared, Younger Jensen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-25 20:10:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 53,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14984696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hpjk_addict/pseuds/hpjk_addict
Summary: England, 1815Jensen is an extremely pious young man. He is determined to live a life of purity, devotion, obedience and self-denial, devoid of all passions, pleasures and diversions. His one and only ambition is to become a clergyman. His mission in life is to atone for his mother’s sins that broke apart his family and caused his father’s death when he was a child.However, his plans are irrevocably ruined when his guardians’ son, Jared, returns. Jared disrupts his daily life, disturbs his peace of mind, makes him feel things that he has never felt before and challenges all of his notions about himself. He overwhelms him with his liberal touches, embraces and caresses, makes him blush at his unabashed nakedeness, makes him laugh, teaches him to enjoy life outside his studies and gradually seduces him into his bed.Following his desires for the very first time in his life, Jensen agrees to accompany Jared to London in order to explore their forbidden relationship that, should it become public knowledge, will destroy them both – unless, of course, Jared’s past affairs, youthful indiscretions and a terrible secret that he intends to keep from Jensen will tear them apart first.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I want to thank my faithful reader, cheerleader and beta @AnotherWorld311 for daily inspiration and support. I know that it wouldn’t have been possible for me to write so fast or so much without her.
> 
> I also want to thank my wonderful artist @winchestergirl for picking my fic in the first place and for creating such excellent and historically accurate pieces to go with it, despite her extreme lack of sleep and time, poor thing.
> 
> I took the liberty of peppering the fic with quotes from “Osborne or The Country Gentleman. A Tale for the Times.” by the Rev. Joseph Jones – a rather obscure book that I found entirely by chance but that seemed to fit right in with the mood of the story.
> 
> *taking a deep breath and sending a prayer* I can only hope that you will give this fic a chance and that you will enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Feedback - this ambrosia for the writer's soul - is greatly appreciated!

St Anthony Parish Church has never seen a soul more devout or a sight more divine than that of Jensen Ackles hearkening to the word of God from the front pew. Unlike the rest of the congregation, he did not seem to mind or care or even notice that the mouthpiece of said word was bald and decidedly ill-favoured. The young man’s unclouded gaze of luminous green eyes was fixed upon wondrous and glorious visions of God’s work far removed from the mundane. His fair complexion seemed so transparent it looked as though it was lit from within. His cheeks were flushed with the vigour of his prayer, while his plush lips fervently mouthed the sacred words.

A single beam of late autumn sun, cold and sharp, speared the mullioned windows of the old church building and lay like an enormous golden shard of broken glass on the stone floor, encasing Jensen within its ethereal light like a precious stone within its frame, his gilded silhouette serving as a kind of beacon for every wandering gaze and every stray thought of the flock. His broad shoulders, slim waist and the roundness of his rear, perfectly accentuated by the cut of his dark greatcoat, were dwelt upon with interest and devoutness that neither the text of the sermon nor its important message on godliness and goodness seemed to merit.

The echoing stiffness of the vaulted hall was constantly agitated by ringing warnings of terrible punishment that should befall all sinners least they promptly embark upon the path of righteousness, coming from the pulpit and accompanied by a threatening fist of the parson. It was also from time to time interrupted by the rustling of skirts and the creaking of pews when one or another of the young ladies present wished to get a better view of the divine in the first row. Such actions were instantly followed by a loud sigh of pure longing, which the minister, however, regarded as a favourable sign of repentance.

Jensen, bless him, was completely unaware of the effect that he had on the others, for had he known of their impure thoughts, he would perish with shame on the spot. He did not wish to think of his looks. In fact, he considered them nothing but an ugly blemish upon his life – an unwanted relic that he inherited from his wicked mother. He was an extremely devout young man, determined to live a life of piety, obedience and self-denial. His ambition was to become a clergyman and serve God and people in his charge to the best of his ability. His life’s mission was to atone for his mother’s sins by leading a life of a righteous man. He could not allow himself to feel vanity or pride in his appearance when he was convinced that it was his mother’s fine looks as well as her vicious nature that had led to her ruin.

He was about eleven when his much-loved father discovered that his mother was having an affair with a younger man. Upon learning that she was with child, his father threw her out of the house. Yet he loved her so deeply that her betrayal broke his heart and he died soon afterwards. Jensen was taken in by Mr and Mrs Padalecki – his father’s dearest friends – who became his guardians and provided him with a new home, promising to raise him as their own child, at the time when their only son, Jared, expressed an ardent wish to go abroad, where he continued to reside in the course of the last ten years. Jensen, who had been profoundly oppressed by his mother’s fall, had taken great pains to be nothing like her.

However, whatever his own views on his looks and their merits were, it was an indisputable fact that all the young ladies in the neighbourhood were in love with him. He was pronounced to be the handsomest man to ever walk the earth – his mesmerizing green eyes, impossibly long eyelashes and perfectly-shaped lips haunted many a reverie – and even a smattering of freckles that generously sprinkled his fair complexion was universally admired despite general tendency of the public to the contrary. Besides, he was not only heavenly beautiful but also rich and intelligent and it was said that he had a voice of an angel. He wore dark, unassuming clothes, which made his beauty even more pronounced, and carried a prayer book wherever he went; his air was melancholy but he admired nature with an enraptured eye; not to mention that they all found him terribly romantic on account of his tragic past.

No female heart whose mistress was of a romantic turn could withstand such a combination, and many vied for his attention upon leaving the church, preening and strutting and blushing and simpering and showing off their gowns, shoes, bonnets and jewels; all wore their very best. Dr Pileggi, the clergyman of the parish, was humbly gratified by the notion that he was, perhaps, the only vicar whose flock was so pious, especially young ladies, so as not to flee as soon as the sermon was over. Instead, they dawdled as he stood by the entrance at the conclusion of the service, accompanied by his patrons, Mr and Mrs Padalecki and their ward, praising the sermon with ebullience in so many voices one could hardly hear anything and imploring young Mr Ackles to copy it down for them for he had such a fine hand!

It was Mr and Mrs Padalecki’s long-standing tradition to invite Dr Pileggi to take tea with them after the sermon. Miss Heafey, his niece, who was also to have the honour of joining them and being driven in their carriage into the bargain, was regarded with envy and vexation by all the other young ladies of the parish, who watched them depart with extremely sour looks; colourful feathers, bright ribbons and fine lace on their bonnets and gowns drooping forlornly in their wake. However, they were consoled by the fact that Jensen was to go on horseback beside the carriage, for there was not enough room inside, and it was with another longing sigh that they watched his retreating form, his rear swaying most enticingly with the gentle trot of his horse.

Mr Padalecki and Dr Pileggi were in the habit of discussing the affairs of the parish first, while the others listened on and provided comments and observations whenever they had anything of import to say.

“I must congratulate you on how finely this young man turned out,” said the vicar once there was nothing more to be said on that head, fixing his shrewd gaze and his index finger upon Jensen, who instantly tensed under the scrutiny. “I hope you will forgive me for mentioning it, my dear sir, but I must confess that I was plagued by many a doubt when you took him in. I mean to say, considering the unfortunate circumstances surrounding Jensen’s earlier years as well Jared’s dissipated ways… well!” He cleared his throat. “I prayed most ardently for all of you and my prayers have been answered. I have rarely seen a more pious young man in my life. It is so rarely that one encounters such genuine devotion these days and Jensen sets an excellent example to the rest of the congregation. Tell me, young man, is it still your ambition to join the church?”

Jensen inclined his head.

“Indeed. I wish for nothing more. I mean to get ordained by the end of this twelvemonth, provided I am able to procure a living.”

“By the end of this twelvemonth!” interjected Mr Padalecki with a nervous chortle. “Well, well! I say, let us not be so hasty, shall we?”

“Jensen, dear, but you are still so young,” said Mrs Padalecki in a rather appalled manner. “And so very handsome too,” she added as though his looks could have any bearing upon his choice of profession. “How do you know that this is what you truly want?”

Jensen knew that they meant well and that they wanted the best for him or what they thought was the best for him, but he was rather vexed that after all these years they still refused to take his ambition of becoming a clergyman seriously.

“I am one and twenty, ma’am,” he replied humbly but firmly. “I know precisely what I want. I have been meaning to embark upon this path half of my life at least. You must know that. I have never concealed my intentions from you. I know in my heart of hearts that this is what I wish and should be.”

He looked earnestly, beseechingly at his guardians, willing them to understand, to accept his choice of profession. They looked back aggrieved and concerned.

“Well, listen to my advice, son, and take a wife first,” continued Dr Pileggi, throwing a rather blunt look in his niece’s direction. “Jessica has been of great help and comfort to me ever since my dear wife passed away; may her soul rest in peace. Now the lion’s share of duties about the parish falls on her shoulders – but she never repines. Never! Isn’t that so, child?"

“Dear uncle, please, it is nothing at all,” murmured Miss Heafey, lowering her eyes to her lap in a very convincing display of humility and modesty. “Upon my word, I do not deserve such high praise for merely following your orders and discharging my duty as any loving and dutiful niece would do.”

Her uncle waved her words away and went on –

“As for the living, well, that can be easily arranged. I am more than happy to hold onto it until you enter orders. I am an old man,” he added when Jensen opened his mouth to protest; “I wish to spend more time with my books and my plants. However, I would like to see my parishioners in good hands and having watched you become the man of steadfast faith and sound principles I am convinced that you shall make an excellent shepherd.”

Mr Padalecki frowned and Mrs Padalecki let out a small sound of discontent that never reached her lips but got stuck in her throat, swiftly assuming the characteristics of a cough. Jensen murmured his thanks and looked away in agitation, though not before he caught Dr Pileggi exchange a meaningful look with his niece.

Jensen’s mind was abuzz. He had always assumed that he would succeed Dr Pileggi as the clergyman of the parish, naturally having successfully overcome his guardians’ objections to his entering orders in the first place. After all, he reasoned, it was only natural to suppose that they would not wish such a living to fall into the hands of a perfect stranger, especially when they had a ready-made parson in his person, intimately acquainted as he was with all the particulars of the neighbourhood and its inhabitants.

However, it could not have been plainer that Dr Pileggi expected Jensen to marry his niece before stepping down from his clerical duties, and as much as Jensen did not wish to disappoint the vicar, marrying Miss Heafey was the last thing on his mind.

Nevertheless, it greatly bothered Jensen that on both these points – his profession and marriage – he displayed what he could only regard, with the deepest of shame, as disobligingness and stubbornness, which, in its turn, pointed at want of pliancy and docility of temper.

He was uncomfortably aware that he did not like being told what to do when his mind was made up and was unyielding in his convictions where he should show submission to authority of his elders. It made him wonder in trepidation whether his guardians’ liberal upbringing and his mother’s curse had left more of a mark upon him that he had previously suspected.

He, therefore, decided that proper humility and servility had to be further exercised, and vowed that but for these two instances he would raise no more objections and would willingly submit himself to demands and wishes of others.


	2. Chapter 2

Jensen indeed intended to take a wife before long, for he knew that a married clergyman was always preferable to an unmarried one. However, as it was also his intention to lead a life of piety and penance, he thought that he should choose from a less favourable quarter. Miss Heafey was rather too handsome, in his opinion, and besides had been left a considerable sum of money by her parents upon their death, all of which spoke decidedly against her in Jensen’s views on what his future wife ought to be.

“I think that we have been too generous with our invitations,” said Mrs Padalecki coldly, when there were just the three of them left in the drawing-room, addressing herself chiefly to her husband. “Our solicitous hospitality has been met with ungrateful familiarity and presumption. To think that we would be happy with the connection! To think that we would allow his interference into our affairs! To have the nerve to as good as tell Jensen to marry his niece in order to get the living – as if it is his to give away in the first place! Knowing, too, how vehemently we oppose the idea of his entering orders in the first place. I have never been more scandalized in all my life! Upon my word, I could hardly keep my countenance. What an ungrateful man!”

Mr Padalecki nodded gravely but was saved from the necessity of replying when his wife continued –

“I never liked her much. Miss Heafey. A sly, dark, little thing.” Mrs Padalecki sniffed. “Just because she has a clergyman for an uncle doesn’t mean that she has the right to aspire to be a gentleman’s wife! For all we know she is a mere nobody. I’m sure Jensen would no more think of marrying her than of marrying the cook.”

Jensen knew that his guardians loved him as their own flesh and blood and had anticipated that they would fall into that common parental error of considering any female with matrimonial designs upon him not good enough to be his wife. He did not agree with that notion in the least, holding, in fact, an opposing view. However, their opinions coincided in one important particular.

“I have no intention of marrying Miss Heafey,” he said and Mrs Padalecki smiled in relief. “However,” he continued, “I could always find a living elsewhere. I would, naturally, prefer to remain in my own parish. But I shall be happy to discharge my duty wherever there is a place.”

“But Jensen, dear, we don’t want you to,” said Mrs Padalecki plaintively.

“I know you don’t, ma’am. I just don’t know why. I hope you will not think me too impudent to inquire as to what your objection is?” He frowned as a sudden idea occurred to him. “Is it, perhaps, that you do not think me worthy, considering what my mother was?”

Mrs Padalecki looked horrified. Mr Padalecki choked on his drink.

“Good Lord, Jensen!” cried the former. “Do not be so very silly! How could you possibly think that we – ! Upon my word, I am going to faint...”

The conversation was halted until Mrs Padalecki’s salts were liberally applied by her maid and her fainting spell successfully prevented.

“Then what is it?” murmured Jensen afterwards with a note of plea and desperation in his voice, his eyes downcast in shame for causing the commotion.

Mr Padalecki, having returned from the sideboard, where he had poured himself another glass, cleared his throat and exchanged a look with his wife. Mrs Padalecki nodded, her eyes half-closed, apparently too weak to speak.

“Son,” said Mr Padalecki slowly, “it is simply that we do not think that you want to go into orders for the right reasons.”

Jensen frowned.

“What do you mean, sir?”

“Well, in the main, we think that you have convinced yourself that you should atone for something that has no bearing on your person or your character whatsoever. We think that you see going into orders as a sacrifice rather than a service and while we do not doubt that you will make an excellent clergyman and that you will apply yourself most admirably to the task of steering your flock in the right direction we do not think that your heart is truly in it.”

“I hope I have proven – ”

“Jensen, dear, we simply think that you’re throwing your life away!” cried Mrs Padalecki.

Jensen looked incredulously at her.

“I don’t know why you would think that,” he said slowly. “I have hardly anything to recommend myself to the world but the fortune I inherited from my father and the looks I inherited from my mother.”

“Oh, Jensen; I wish you would not be so hard upon yourself!”

“I am merely speaking the truth, ma’am. I do not think that my reasons for becoming a clergyman are not justified or unacceptable or all that unusual. And it is not as though by going into orders I mean to leave society and spend the rest of my life in a cell or a cave like a monk or a hermit.”

“But that’s just it, Jensen! Don’t you see it? You might as well live in a cave or a cell for all we know! You keep no company, you have no friends; you spend all your days reading your books or translating ancient texts. In fact, if I did not insist on your reading to me in the evenings we would barely see you at all!” Mrs Padalecki wrung her hands. “You are so young! So handsome! But you do not take pleasure in anything! You do not live. I sometimes wonder whether you know what it even means. Oh! I thought that going to university would cure you of your ridiculous notions but the time that you spent there only seemed to solidify your conviction that you should bury yourself alive. We are simply worried about you, Jensen... can’t you see that?”

There were tears in her eyes and Jensen felt terrible for making her cry.

“There, there, my dear,” said Mr Padalecki soothingly. “You will give yourself a headache if you go on in this manner.”

He stood up and approached the sideboard again. He had not looked at Jensen with reproach or coldness but upon briefly meeting his eye Jensen felt as though he had stabbed his guardian right in the heart. Mr Padalecki mixed his wife some water and wine in aggrieved silence and handed her the glass that she accepted with a weak smile and a trembling hand.

Jensen was in agony.

“You have always been nothing but good and kind to me,” he said. “You have become my parents in every sense of the word. I feel like the basest of creatures repaying for everything that you’ve done for me by making you weep on my account. But if nothing short of my not going into orders should appease you, I am ready to – ”

Mrs Padalecki shook her head and beckoned him towards her. Jensen instantly obeyed and a second later knelt at her chair. She took his hands in hers and squeezed them tightly, smiling warmly down at him through tears in her eyes.

“My dear,” she said kindly, “we are not quite so unreasonable or selfish as to ask you to give it up entirely when you are so clearly set on pursuing this path. We merely ask you not to rush into taking orders just yet. There will be time enough after a twelvemonth, do you not think so? We just want you to apply yourself to the enjoyments and pleasures of life in the same manner you have so far applied yourself to its utter avoidance. We wish to see you happy and we don’t think that becoming a clergyman as early as one and twenty will bring you anything but disappointment and dissatisfaction. Can you wait for at least another year before you commit yourself and partake of life and its joys in the meantime?”

Jensen wasn’t sure what it meant precisely but he nodded his acquiescence.

“I shall make an effort, ma’am.”

Mrs Padalecki beamed at him and kissed him on both cheeks.

“Excellent!” rumbled Mr Padalecki, clapping him on the back as Jensen got up and returned to his chair. “I have just the companion for you.”

“A companion?” asked his wife in surprise. “But who can you mean?”

Mr Padalecki chuckled.

“Jared, of course!”

“Jared!” cried Mrs Padalecki. “Has he written something on that head? Is he coming back? But how come you did not tell me?”

Mr Padalecki shook his head.

“You know the scallywag, Sherri. He never writes unless he needs money,” replied her husband good-naturedly. “However, Dr Pileggi’s words about retiring reminded me that I am not getting any younger myself and that it is high time Jared returned home and assumed his duties. I shall write to him on the morrow. I think that the boys will do each other a great deal of good.”

“How do you mean, Gerald?”

“Jensen will temper Jared’s recklessness and Jared will enliven Jensen’s gravity, of course.”

“Do you remember Jared, dear?” asked Mrs Padalecki with a beatific smile, addressing Jensen again. “Of course, you were but a boy when he left…”

Jensen nodded. “I do remember him, ma’am.” Their families being very close back then, they used to spend a lot of time together. Jensen’s childhood memories were somewhat vague but he remembered an extremely tall young man with a roguish grin and very pronounced dimples, who was always kind and attentive to him and who devoted hours to his amusement. He also recalled that Jared was the one who patiently coaxed him on his very first horse. Jensen was extremely fond of him as a child.

Of course, that was before he learnt about Jared’s gaming, drinking, carnal pleasures with maids (some of them still gossiped about it to this day) and general life of never-ending dissipation. Jensen hoped that the last ten years had produced a favourable change in his character and style of living and resolved that should he find it unaltered to try and reform Jared with his own example and instruction. He knew that his guardians would approve.


	3. Chapter 3

The news of Jared’s impending return spread through the country like wildfire and brought most of its inhabitants into the state of frenzied anticipation. Here was another eligible bachelor, landed and loaded, on whom to pin one’s matrimonial hopes and many a family with young ladies of marriageable age to spare began to form schemes and make plans for the attack.

Jared arrived in due course, following a short exchange of letters between himself and his father. The first distant sound of his carriage along the gravelled lane leading to the house had Mrs Padalecki fluttering about the room like a butterfly, a white lace handkerchief trembling frantically in her hand. Her maid was stationed nearby with salts and aromatic vinegar at the ready; in case her mistress was rendered faint or experienced a headache with too much excitement. Mr Padalecki was pacing the room with a heavy tread, muttering something under his breath and occasionally falling back on his old and mostly abandoned habit of sniffing tobacco from his ornate snuff-box, which he only ever did when experiencing a certain perturbation of spirits.

Jensen was likewise discomposed by the looming event that was of so much importance to his guardians. However, unlike them, he sat rigidly in his chair, licking his lips in agitation, an open but entirely forgotten book of sermons clutched in his numb fingers. It was important to make a good first impression, he told himself, not knowing how much of him or their past interaction Jared remembered. Unfortunately, it suddenly struck him that he was not very good at communicating with people, having rarely bothered to do so before.

He would have been greatly amused by all the servants lurking in the shadows about the place, like some living statues, in hopes of getting the first glimpse of their young master, if he hadn’t been so terrified at the mere idea of having to talk to the man.

Finally, the doors to the drawing-room were flung open and Jared Padalecki strode inside with an assured step and a wide grin, thrusting his hat, gloves and a walking stick to his servant, who took them, bowed and scurried away. Mrs Padalecki, forgetting all propriety, screamed and threw herself into her son’s open arms. Mr Padalecki chortled and clapped him on the back.

“Mother! Father!” boomed Jared. “I declare it is capital to see you both in excellent health and spirits.”

“Jared, you’re home! My dear boy is home!” Mrs Padalecki all but wept with joy.

Jensen, who vacated his chair as soon as Jared had entered the room, followed the emotional exchange from the shadows he had joined, only half aware of the excited whispers of the servants who were not even supposed to be there. His own attention was fixed with great interest upon the newcomer and he was grateful that no one paid him any notice for it allowed him the leisure to get a good look at the man.

He was, as he remembered, extremely tall and broad-shouldered, made even broader by three layers of lapels of his coat. His hair was long and wavy, tied at the nape of his neck; a number of unruly strands escaped the purple ribbon and fell across his grinning face. It was an old-fashioned hairstyle but it suited him well. Jensen carefully studied his handsome face, expecting to find some visible traces of dissipation there but finding none. He was also attempting to catch familiar features and restore them to that of a young man he once knew when Mrs Padalecki called him over.

“Jensen, dear, where have you got to? Come here and greet Jared. Heavens! Why are you skulking in the shadows?”

“There’s a good lad,” said Mr Padalecki with a nod when Jensen did as he was told.

He had made only a few paces when he found himself rooted to the spot by the intensity of the other man’s cat-like eyes. Jared’s smile widened and his dimples deepened.

“Jensen… my adopted brother!” he said warmly. “Last time I saw you I swear you were this tall.” He placed his hand level with his midriff. “If memory serves right I used to carry you on my back.”

Jensen blushed at the sudden recollection of Jared pretending to be a particularly eager pony in order to teach Jensen how to hold his grip and not to fall off.

“I was a child then,” he mumbled. “I’m not one anymore.”

Jared looked him up and down in a manner that made Jensen blush even more.

“Indeed not,” he purred. Jensen frowned. “However, you are still shorter than I am.”

“Hardly the most difficult feat to accomplish when you are as tall as a Cornish giant,” commented Jensen dryly, making Jared laugh.

“True. I bet I could still carry you on my back.”

“I’d rather you don’t. You might hurt yourself.”

Jared looked stupendously indignant at that. “Are you calling me old? Do you think me crippled by age?”

Jensen began to stutter an apology, afraid that he had offended him, when he saw that Jared was grinning again. Jensen huffed and glared at him.

“I can assure you, Jensen, that I am yet to feel the savage claws of age ravaging my flesh and bones with rheumatism and gout,” said Jared, quite unperturbed by Jensen’s scowl. “Here! Let me prove it to you.”

In one swift move he pulled off his overcoat that was instantly caught by his servant, who had materialized out of nowhere and vanished in thin air the next second, and began to advance upon Jensen with a challenging glint in his eyes.

It took Jensen a moment to realize that he was in earnest. But even then he would not believe it. He shook his head and began to retreat backwards with a frown of incredulity. “You wouldn’t dare,” he whispered. Surely not!

Jared just smirked – and pounced.

Jensen yelped and tried to move out of his way but Jared was taller and much too quick for him. In a matter of seconds he maneuvered himself so that he had no trouble heaving Jensen onto his back.

“Jared, you’re mad!” shouted Jensen, catching Jared’s neck in a tight grip so as not to fall down, his face aflame.

“Is that so?”

Jared roared with laughter and hunching over with a fully grown man on his back began to run around the room amidst his parents’ cries of astonished amusement and Jensen’s entirely silent horrified mortification.

It was not until Mrs Padalecki began to plead with him to have mercy on her nerves and put Jensen down that Jared finally relented and deposited the younger man gently on his feet before collapsing onto the nearby sofa, giggling like a schoolboy. Jensen was breathing heavily, swelling with the indignation of being treated like a small child, when, with another jolt of shock, he felt Jared grasping him by the wrist and tugging him down.

Before he could do anything but gasp, still mildly dizzy from being carried about the room, he lost his footing and tumbled onto the sofa right next to Jared, who instantly wrapped his long and incredibly strong arm around Jensen’s shoulders. Jensen struggled against his grip but in vain. For the first time in his life he felt an insurmountable desire to swear – and not in a divine way.

Jared chuckled.

“Jensen, calm down, will you?” he drawled in amusement. “I am merely trying to help you. I declare you looked like you were about to faint.”

“I did not!” snapped Jensen at once, feeling another wave of embarrassment colouring his face.

Jared raised an eyebrow that challenged that statement.

“Fine,” grumbled Jensen, averting his bashful gaze. “But I would not have looked like fainting if you hadn’t got it into your thick head to carry me on your back like a sack of potatoes!”

Jared merely laughed.

“I have never met anyone quite so grave at your time of life. I believe I will enjoy teaching you how to lighten up.”

“Well! I believe I will enjoy making it extremely difficult for you then,” retorted Jensen.

He looked up when he heard a loud chuckle coming from the other side of the room and was irritated to find that Mr and Mrs Padalecki were looking at them in a blissful manner that suggested that they had never seen anything quite so endearing than the two of them bickering. Jensen sighed; he had a disquieting feeling that his life would never be the same again and that he wouldn’t have another moment’s peace with Jared around.

However, the rest of the afternoon was spent in less distressing fashion and before long Jensen began to relax and regain some of his equilibrium. Jared left to change and to refresh himself after the journey soon afterwards, allowing Jensen to collect his thoughts and to compose himself by taking up his book and pondering the many sermons it provided on patience and forbearance.

Jared joined them for dinner and was instantly drawn into an animated conversation by Mrs Padalecki, who wished to apprise him of everything that had been taking place in the neighbourhood during his long absence. Later, when Mrs Padalecki left them after dinner to prepare tea and coffee in the drawing-room, Mr Padalecki quizzed his son on his political views and affiliations and meticulously inquired into the political situation on the continent.

Jensen was not required to take part in either conversation, knowing everything about the neighbourhood and nothing about politics, and was rather amused by Jared’s desperate attempts to quit both subjects and his pleas to talk of something less dull. Naturally, Jensen tried not to show his amusement but he wasn’t sure that he’d succeeded when he caught Jared’s suspicious squint. Funnily enough, it did not stop his lips from twitching or his eyes from twinkling.

Their usual evening routine was enlivened by a game of whist that they could play in a quiet family circle now that there were four of them. Jensen hoped that with Jared around he would be able to avoid the duty of reading to Mrs Padalecki from one of the seven volumes of _The History of Sir Charles Grandison_ that she adored since her youth but was once again called to perform his duty upon the conclusion of the game.

He did not dare oppose his guardian’s wish and took up a thick tome with an air of a self-sacrificing martyr. Jared looked at the title and groaned, sending Jensen a commiserating look.


	4. Chapter 4

Jensen was not a morning person and considering it a most unfortunate personal flaw second only to his beauty made it a habit of rousing himself at daybreak independent of time of year in order to take a long walk through the park before breakfast. There was a large pond at the bottom of the park that he liked to visit and contemplate – for nothing exhibited the change of season and the swift tread of time, governed by the hand of God, as its ever-changing surface.

He expected to find that Jared would be one of those men who did not grace others with their presence until well after noon and was therefore shocked beyond anything when he discovered that it was not so. Jensen was just descending the path, leading to the pond, when he noticed an unusual disturbance taking place within its murky waters; after all, the early winter air was quite still, the sounds muffled by the mist hanging low over the fields.

Intrigued, Jensen hurried onwards with a quickened step and upon reaching the steep bank of the pond stopped dead in his tracks just as a tall figure of a man – a completely naked man – began to emerge from within. He was shaking his head, making his long hair fly in all directions, sending a shower of droplets back where they belonged, before brushing the sodden strands out of his eyes. Jensen stared, unable to move, unable to close his mouth, unable to look away...

Jared flexed his arms and Jensen saw veins pop and muscles move there. No wonder he could not break his grip the day before. His eyes fell upon the man’s broad chest, fascinated by the multitude of crystal droplets that greedily clung to the abundance of curly hairs there. Jared seemed quite unperturbed by the cold. In fact, he seemed to relish it. His stomach was taut and ripped and Jensen’s gaze slid downwards as though unable to help itself, following the winding trail of dark hair towards –

Jensen jerked his head upwards upon realizing what he was about to find there, painfully cricking his neck. His face coloured and his eyes widened when he caught Jared staring back at him, as little perturbed by his nakedness as by the cold, an amused smirk on his lips.

“Heyday, Jensen! Fancy a swim?”

Filled with terror and shame, Jensen willed his limbs to move and fled the scene that was now ringing with Jared’s uproarious laughter. Rich and warm and inviting, it was still ringing in Jensen’s ears long after he had left its owner behind. It was tugging at something deep and savage and starved within him, something he didn’t know even lay slumbering there, waiting to be stirred awake one day, something he had no name for – something that felt a lot like sin.

He was running before he knew it; trembling, confused, shaken…

*

Jensen was drinking his second cup of coffee in a kind of torpor, alone for his guardians never took their breakfast so early in the morning, when Jared strode into the breakfast-parlour and took a seat across from him. Jensen sucked in a breath and dropped his gaze into the cup; it was trembling in the palms of his hands.

“I’m afraid I haven’t had the pleasure of wishing you a very good morning,” said Jared, addressing himself warmly to Jensen.

Jensen mumbled something so indistinguishable into his cup that even he wasn’t sure what it was supposed to have been. Jared chuckled throatily as though he had heard something extremely diverting.

“Tell me, Jensen,” he continued merrily and Jensen’s insides began to squirm unpleasantly, “do you make a habit of ogling other men in the middle of their morning swim?”

The coffee cup fell onto its saucer with an ear-splitting clatter, splashing Jensen along with his immediate vicinity with the remnants of the dark brown liquid he so loved. The next moment Jensen sprang to his feet, his eyes flashing angrily.

“How dare you, sir?” he snarled, finally meeting Jared’s gaze. “How dare you?”

The other man was leaning against the back of his chair, looking rather amused and pleased with himself. He spread his arms. “I am merely wondering because I have been subjected to what I perceived to be an extremely thorough examination conducted on your part not half an hour ago.”

Jensen’s hands were shaking at his sides. The man had some nerve!

“And do you, sir, make a habit of swimming without a stitch on you there where other men usually take their morning walk?” he asked acidly. “I did not expect to come across such a sight!” he added defensively.

“And a devilishly fine sight too, I believe!” added Jared, obviously enjoying himself. “I’m sure you took your chance to properly appreciate it.”

“I assure you that appreciating it was the last thing on my mind! Forgetting about it was what I was fully concerned with.”

“I find it hard to believe considering how insistently your eye travelled downwards.”

“I...”

Jensen felt the floor of the breakfast-parlour shift beneath his feet. He swiftly dropped his gaze. He knew not what to respond to such a just observation. He could hardly deny that he was looking and for some time too! In fact, he had found that he could not look away. Dread filled him once more.

“It won’t happen again,” he whispered and turned on his heels, fully intending to flee.

“Jensen, wait! You haven’t finished your breakfast,” said Jared conversationally. “In fact, you have barely touched anything on your plate from what I can see.”

“I’m not hungry,” mumbled Jensen, burning with shame.

“Come now,” said Jared kindly. “Don’t say that. Don’t let this – ah – silly misunderstanding spoil your appetite.”

Jensen shook his head. No. He could not even imagine looking Jared in the eye ever again. He would have to leave, to flee the country...

He started violently when he felt a light touch of a single finger upon his wrist. Jensen instinctively tried to take his hand away but Jared’s hand closed firmly around it, rendering his attempt unsuccessful. Jensen was so intent on not letting Jared see his face that he failed to notice how he ended up pressed with his back against Jared’s solid chest, the other man’s strong arms coming to wrap themselves around him from behind. Jensen found himself effectively trapped.

“Now,” began Jared smoothly, talking right into his ear, “there is nothing to be embarrassed about,” he said. Jensen snorted. “Do not be such a silly little goose about it. Do not make a piece of work out of nothing. Think about it thus if you will. You saw me as God intended for you to see me.”

“I doubt that God intended for me to see you naked, Jared,” objected Jensen at once; the notion was so ridiculous and preposterous that it promptly dealt away with some portion of his mortification.

“Personally, I do not know what your objection is,” continued Jared and Jensen tried not to pay attention to the fact that tiny puffs of air that he was releasing with each word tickled the side of his face. “A great number of people would die of ecstasy if they found themselves in your place for it is but precious few who get to see me like this – or at all – in the morning.”

“I am fortunate indeed.”

“I’m glad you’re beginning to see what has transpired in a more positive light.”

Jensen thought in alarm that he was beginning to feel too comfortable in Jared’s arms when the latter spun him around. Jared tut-tutted and grasped his chin when Jensen still refused to meet his eye.

“Jensen, we are going to be spending a lot of time together. Surely it would make things a lot easier if you could actually look at me? Well, at my face at least… not my nether region, you know...”

Jensen looked up and glared at him.

“There!” cried Jared. “Much better! You’ve got the prettiest eyes of anyone I’ve ever seen. By the by, will it help matters if I am to see you naked too?”

Jensen didn’t think that he could glare harder at the man without his eyes popping out of his eye sockets but he thought he could resort to pushing him away from his person with all his might, which was precisely what he did the next moment. Jared stumbled backwards but quickly recovered himself and roared with laughter.

Jensen suspected that the older man was simply teasing him but he was so infuriating and smug about it and his insinuations so audacious and insufferable that Jensen wanted to scream with vexation. He barely knew himself. He had never been known to lose his composure so swiftly and so completely before.

“Jensen, there is so much I could teach you,” said Jared silkily as he took his seat at the breakfast table again.

“I’m sure you could,” agreed Jensen, joining him resolutely at the table and looking him straight in the eye. He decided that he had sufficiently embarrassed himself in the course of a single morning and that he would not be driven to running like a coward again.

Jared looked impressed and gave him a nod of approval.

“However,” continued Jensen, now buttering a scone, “one man said that _knowledge is valuable, but morality is essential_. I find that I fully agree with this sentiment.”

Jared scoffed. “Morality!”

Jensen raised an eyebrow at his derision. “They say that _a man without honour and virtue is only the shadow of a man_ ,” he said reproachfully. “So take a care, Jared.”

Jared waved his words away.

“I declare it is the most unnatural thing in the world to wear so grave a countenance on so pretty a face,” he said instead.

“I’m sure I have never – ”

“Met anyone as pretty as yourself? I have to agree with you there.”

Jensen made a face.

“I didn’t – that’s not what I – ” He shook his head and prayed for patience. “I have never heard of a notion more ridiculous. I have not been aware that there existed a direct connection between one’s physiognomy and those facial expressions one should wear depending upon it.”

“But of course!” replied Jared as though it was the most natural conclusion to arrive at. “A plain or an ugly face must always be dour or grave or sour or mean – one doesn’t expect anything else for it will only disrupt the natural balance of things. But a pretty face must always be graced by a pretty smile and an expression of carefree merriment, luscious sweetness and glowing delight. What?”

Jensen shook his head. “It is merely that I cannot make out whether you are in earnest and mean the words that you say or whether you take pleasure in putting me out of my countenance. But I am not afraid of you, Jared. I don’t care that you are a man of the world and ten years my senior. You do not scare me.”

Jared smiled.

“I would be much aggrieved if I did for I truly enjoy your company and I would not wish to lose it. I do mean it, Jensen,” he said softly when Jensen appeared to be unconvinced.

Jensen thought about his words before nodding slowly.

“Yes, I believe you do. Though, truthfully, I hardly know why.”

“Well! I shall not deprive you of the chance to figure it out on your own,” said Jared. Jensen frowned and Jared added, “Do not worry your pretty head over it now, love. It shall come to you when the time is right.”

Jensen blushed at the endearment but felt completely confounded by the meaning of Jared’s words.

*

Mrs Padalecki was delighted when upon entering the breakfast-parlour with her husband a short time later she saw the two of them sitting together at the table, having breakfast and a pleasant conversation. “Oh, Gerald!” she exclaimed, clutching his forearm. “Look at them! Isn’t it just what we wished for? For them to be such good friends! I am so happy. So happy indeed!”

“I told you they would, my dear, didn’t I?” Mr Padalecki chortled, looking extremely pleased with himself.

This time Jensen found it much harder to regain his equilibrium and equanimity for each time he looked at Jared across the table, amidst Mrs Padalecki’s merry chatter, the memory of the other man’s naked form would intrude without impunity upon his mind. Jensen would blush and stutter and lose his train of thought, if he were speaking at the time, and upon catching Jared’s eye would instantly know by that arch look of his that he knew just what had affected him so.


	5. Chapter 5

Jensen preferred to devote the hours following breakfast to study and reflection. However, he knew that today he was expected to join the rest of the family in the formal drawing-room in order to receive their neighbours, anxious fathers and mothers of unmarried young ladies for the most part, who would shortly descend upon them in droves so as to pay their respects to Jared, thus obliging him to pay them a return visit, no doubt hoping that he would choose one of their daughters to be his future wife before the end of the year.

Being an observer by nature and, thankfully, not being required to be anything else on present occasion, Jensen spent the time, that would have been quite wasted otherwise, watching Jared, having found him a fascinating object of human study. He was cheerful, gallant, witty and loud. His manners were open and inviting and his wide dimpled smile was warm and engaging. He generously complimented the ladies, making them blush and simper like debutantes at their first ball, jovially exchanged jokes and anecdotes with the gentlemen, making them roar with laughter, and was never in want of anything to say.

Jensen had heard much of his charm before and suspected, much to his astonished disgruntlement, that he had unwittingly fallen under its spell, the other man’s constant teasing notwithstanding.

However, there was another reason. Jared seemed to be the only person in the room to remember his existence, while Jensen was doing an excellent job of being invisible, taking no part in general conversation and standing quite still in the corner well shaded by an old mulberry tree outside. Jensen was oddly touched and gratified by the attention. Jared would often seek him out in order to share a look, a smile, a raised eyebrow or even an eye-roll at something or other being said or done, as though Jensen was the only one who would understand. Jensen was pleased by the distinction.

“Well! That was a singularly mind-numbing manner in which to spend an afternoon,” said Jared with a huge yawn a few hours later. “Let us never do that again, shall we?” He rose to his feet and shook his head as though in an attempt to dispel his ennui, which, apparently, was extreme. “I dare say I need a good long ride now to clear my head and to restore my wilted spirits. To imagine that one neighbourhood can hold so many pompous and self-important bores who cannot wait to dispose of their daughters!”

“Jared!” exclaimed Mrs Padalecki, scandalized. “I dare say you will need someone to take care of your shirts and handkerchiefs soon enough. My eyesight is not getting any better, you know, and I won’t be able to embroider your initials ere long.”

“Jensen, will you join me?” asked Jared, moving towards the exit and sending his mother an air kiss over his shoulder.

It did not occur to Jensen to refuse.

They rode at a pleasant canter for quarter of an hour in companionable silence across the extensive grounds belonging to the estate, enjoying crisp winter air and the view of the wooded downs shimmering in the mellow sun. Jensen knew each furlong of the land but was accustomed to tread it on foot rather than on horseback. Yet he had to confess that he rather enjoyed the change and the freedom it gave him.

His eyes, their expression grave and pensive, were once again trained upon Jared’s figure a few paces ahead of him. His long wavy hair was flapping underneath his beaver hat with every move and jolt of his steed; Jensen was once again struck by how different it was from the established fashion of the day, giving him an indisputable distinction.

It took Jensen a moment to wonder at himself for contemplating something so frivolous and inconsequential and he coloured when he recollected Jared’s earlier remark about being in the habit of ogling other men. He could not remember ever ogling any other man before – he hoped that he was not in the habit without realizing it – but he could not help observing the man who used to play with him as a child, wondering whether his life and character would have been at all different had Jared never left.

Jensen was somewhat perplexed to discover that he did not at all begrudge the loss of many hours that he would have employed to greater purpose only a week before, shut up in his study, and was even more astonished to realize that he infinitely preferred Jared’s company to that of his books. He wasn’t at all sorry to be taking an airing with him in place of an imaginary walk with imaginary friends. He had never had a companion before – never thinking that he deserved to have one what with the stain of shame left by his mother upon his family and his name – but he wanted to have one now. He wanted –

“I feel that I must apologize to you,” said Jared cheerfully, interrupting Jensen’s thoughts and joining him so that they were now moving abreast.

“I’m afraid I do not know what you mean.”

“I was given to understand that you have been regarded as the most eligible bachelor in the neighbourhood,” explained Jared. “However, my return has effectively robbed you of the title along with some of your most ardent admirers who, I can only assume, having given up any hope that you might ever favour them with your regard, resolved to transfer their attentions onto me.”

“In this case I should be the one to apologize to you – unless, of course, you do not mind being the subject of such ardent attentions. For my part I feel nothing but relief at being liberated from the burden associated with being considered the most eligible bachelor in the neighhourhdood. I understand that you intend to take a wife now that you are back?”

“Good Lord!” exclaimed Jared. “I have no desire whatever to take a wife.”

Jensen was startled by his vehemence.

“Pray, what gave you the idea?” asked Jared.

Jensen frowned. “I would think it obvious,” he said quietly; “your situation in life, your age, your natural duty to produce an heir in order to pass the estate on to. Doesn’t it all speak in favour of matrimony?”

“A natural duty to produce an heir!” said Jared grimly. “Indeed, that should suffice, should it not?”

“We all must do our duty.”

“But who is to say that I haven’t already produced one? God knows I haven’t always been discreet in my youth.”

Jensen’s eyes widened at the implication.

“I’m afraid that matrimony has never been my object,” continued Jared less fervently after a minute or so. “I know that my parents expect me to settle down and take on the management of the estate now that I have returned. Well, I do not object to the second part but I refuse to consider the first. No female shall take me in!”

“May I enquire as to the reason why you refuse to consider matrimony under such auspicious circumstances?” asked Jensen earnestly. “It would be the most natural thing in the world to choose a wife of good standing and fortune amongst your neighbours,” he added. “Besides, don’t you think that you are being too hasty in rejecting all of them without having been properly introduced to them first?”

“Not at all,” replied Jared airily. “I know without being introduced to them in person that they none of them have what I seek for in a lifelong companion.”

“What – none of them? I can hardly believe it. Pray, what is it that they all lack in your estimation?”

Jared just smiled and setting spurs to his horse galloped away. Jensen blinked in confusion, shook his head and followed him, quickly matching his pace.

Jensen didn’t remember the last time he allowed himself to ride at a full gallop with so much carefree abandon. Upon reflection, it occurred to him that it could have been well back in the day when Jared was overseeing his progress on his first ever horse. How strange! But for many years now he did not think it proper for a future clergyman – the man who was to serve as example of steadiness and circumspection to the community – to gallop across the country in this wild manner, with wind whistling all around him and clumps of mud and grass flying in his wake. Yet how exciting and exhilarating it was to be doing so now! Was it what it felt like to soar through the skies?

Jensen was grinning and laughing and gasping for air when they finally stopped.

“What about you?” asked Jared as though there had been no interruption. “Do you intend to take a wife now that you are – forgive me for the use of the hackneyed phrase – on the cusp of manhood?”

Jensen nodded.

“Ah! So what local belle or wealthy heiress has caught your fancy then? I dare say it’s not the vicar’s niece.” Jared’s mouth twitched.

Jensen shook his head. “I have only been contemplating the matter so far,” he confessed. “However, I have formed a pretty good notion of what my future wife ought to be and neither a local belle nor a wealthy heiress will do.”

“I am intrigued! Why not?”

“For their beauty would most likely have turned them vain and their money extravagant. I would not wish to marry a girl whose primary concern would lie with her looks or possessions.”

“Who then?”

Jensen hesitated; he had not discussed his matrimonial plans with anyone yet and he was afraid that Jared would scoff at his idealistic notions. However, Jared continued to look at him expectantly and Jensen thought that it would be cowardly to change the subject now; not to mention, pointless too, for there was no way that Jared would let the subject drop entirely without picking it up later with his habitual enthusiasm.

“I am not going to marry into money or beauty,” he said slowly, firmly.

“Well, you have both in abundance, I grant you that,” interjected Jared with a nod.

Jensen ignored that observation as he said, “I would like to marry a plain girl of little beauty and no money but of chaste nature, humble disposition, charitable character and pure soul.”

Jared frowned.

“But what would be the point of marrying such an unsightly creature?” he asked.

“The point? I do not understand.”

Jared shook his head. “I mean, Jensen, people marry for money, position, power or passion. But why marry someone who has none of the above, including the ability to inspire your ardour? Surely you cannot guarantee falling in love with someone like that just on principle?”

“Love?” repeated Jensen as though he had never heard of the notion before. “I do not mean to fall in love or in passion with anyone,” he said dismissively, pronouncing the last part with particular distaste. “In fact, I intend to avoid any temptations of material or carnal nature when choosing a wife. I will be guided by my common sense and what I think is right instead.”

Jared’s eyebrows shot upwards and disappeared under the brim of his hat.

“I do not need money or power,” continued Jensen composedly; “in this respect my position in society is secure. Honestly, I do not understand your astonishment. You said yourself that love is not prerequisite of marriage and neither is passion.”

“So what is your object then? Pursuit of felicity with some wretched creature no one else would ever take? What is it precisely? Penance for all the men’s sins? Another feather in your cap before God? Or gratification of your own vanity at another person’s expense?”

“My vanity! I believe I know myself well enough to assure you that vanity is the last thing I can be accused of displaying or acting upon.”

“Maybe so. However, you are not without it, I am sure.”

“We are all imperfect beings inclined to certain evils. The question is whether we give into temptation of practicing them.”

“Ah! So that’s what this is about! I see it now. You wish to avoid temptation of all sorts and intend to guard yourself against them by all means possible, including mortification of the flesh. That’s your object! Hence your wish to take an ugly wife.”

Jensen frowned.

“ _It is as mean as it is vicious to degrade our nature by the gratification of passions that ought to be controlled,_ ” he quoted softly.

“I declare one of these days you will have to give me that blasted book you base your notions and ideas upon.”

“Why?”

“So that I can throw the damn thing into the fire and burn it!”

Jensen flinched and took a deep breath.

“It is my wish to go into orders,” he ground out.

“So I’ve heard.”

“As a clergyman it will be my duty to ameliorate my flock and to set an example of goodness they could follow. Taking as my wife a girl entirely on her own merits without the alloy of beauty or money would be such a thing.”

Jared shook his head. “Would you even know what to do with her on your conjugal bed?”

“I’m not an idiot, Jared,” snapped Jensen. “I know what a man’s duty to his wife is.”

“Duty!” bellowed Jared, throwing his arms upwards. “Duty! Is everything duty to you?”

“ _The path of duty is the proper path for man to walk in._ It is my duty to atone for the sins of my mother.”

Jared looked at him with shock so severe he was robbed of anything to say for a few minutes at least.

“Forgive me,” he said haltingly at length, as though still attempting with insurmountable difficulty to digest Jensen’s previous statement. “Do you somehow consider yourself responsible for your mother’s actions?”

“No, of course not,” replied Jensen. “However, I believe that I could have inherited her vicious nature along with her looks and it is my duty to make sure that it does not take over. It is an old and proven adage, after all, that an apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

They were breathing as heavily as though they had been riding at a full gallop again.

Jared shook his head. “And this is what you have been doing with your life,” he said grimly. “I mean to say, man, is this truly how you have been employing your time?” he asked, puffing out a breath of indignation.

“I’m not sure I understand your objection,” replied Jensen.

“Well! I shall tell you then.”

“I’m sure you will.”

Jared ignored the quip. “You have surrounded yourself with your books on morality and theology and stuffed your pretty head with ridiculous notions of penance and self-denial.” He shook his head again, looking extremely vexed. “God knows, Jensen, I am hardly someone to be making speeches about how you should live your life, but there is something rotten about your scheme.”

“Rotten!”

“Do you think you can avoid temptation all your life?”

“I believe I have been doing an excellent job so far.”

“By avoiding human interaction as much as possible? By hoping to marry someone you will feel no love or lust for?”

“I would feel esteem and – ”

“Pity?”

“No!”

“Marriage is a transaction, Jensen – not a charity.”

Jensen’s temper flared. “What would you know about marriage, Jared?” he sneered. “You have no intention of marrying anyone for any reason!”

“I fully admit that my object is to avoid matrimony at all costs,” said Jared with a conciliatory nod, “but yours apparently is to avoid life.”

Jensen was too stunned to speak. That accusation again!

“I saw you galloping on that horse,” said Jared; suddenly his voice was a soft, gentle murmur, quite different from the manner he’d used only a few moments before.

He touched the side of Jensen’s face with the tips of his gloved fingers and looked him straight in the eye. “You were effulgent with delight, my sweet friend. A perfect picture of felicity. But how often do you feel thus? How often do you allow yourself to feel anything at all? I cannot describe how well you sit in the saddle, Jensen. I have rarely seen a finer horseman.”

“You were the one to teach me how to sit in the saddle, Jared,” whispered Jensen, lowering his eyes that were now prickling and burning from the intensity of Jared’s gaze.

He started when Jared slapped his thigh before aligning their horses so that he could fling his arm around Jensen’s shoulder.

“Luckily for you I have so much more to teach you,” he said with a brilliant smile, squeezing Jensen against his side. “We shall be quite inseparable from now on. What is it? Why are you smiling thus? Do you not believe me? Do you not wish to be my constant companion? My intimate friend? My brother?”

“I am much obliged, I am sure,” said Jensen softly. “I have no objection to your scheme. Indeed, I welcome it with open arms. I would love to have a constant companion. However, I rather doubt that I have what it takes to be one for you. You have all the advantages of age, experience, wisdom and knowledge of the world. I, on the other hand, have nothing to contribute but my pretty head stuffed with silly notions. I am not worldly or lively or eloquent or a sportsman. I’m certain that once the novelty wears off and you grow tired of teasing and teaching me, you will find me awfully dull and my company insupportable.”

Jared shook his head.

“So diffident!”

“I only speak the truth.”

“I’m sure that ours will be a mutually beneficial union, Jensen. I believe you have much to teach me as well.”

Jensen gave him a skeptical look.

“I wish I could but I would not know where to begin.”

Jared stared at him for a moment – then roared with laughter.

“I must say that for all your meekness, you can be quite saucy. I like that.”

Jensen hid a very pleased smile.


	6. Chapter 6

Jensen did not so much as glance at his books in the weeks that followed. No, he had neither forgotten them nor rejected any of his doctrines. However, their engagements abroad at that time were numerous and Jared’s demands upon his time, in particular, great. Each morning, no matter how late they had turned in the night before, he would barge into Jensen’s room and shake him awake, asking him if he hadn’t changed his mind about that swim in the pond.

Roaring with laughter at Jensen’s barely coherent splutters of indignation, flailing limbs and demands to be gone from his room this very instant or he would start throwing things at him, Jared, much diverted by such disorderly display from someone so proper and composed at all other times, which fact, naturally rendered his laughter even more uproarious, would oblige his request after reminding him of their post-breakfast plans.

They would go riding or shooting after breakfast on most days, making Jensen’s morning walk unnecessary and, therefore, obsolete, which, Jensen decided, was fortunate indeed for there was no way that he would follow his favourite path in the direction of the pond now, knowing what he would find there.

It was naturally Jared’s idea, after seeing how well he sat in the saddle, to bring out a sportsman in Jensen. “I’m sure you will make an excellent one,” he’d said one evening, planting himself on the sofa next to Jensen, putting his arm around his shoulder, plucking the book Jensen was reading out of his hands and unceremoniously throwing it out of sight, ignoring Jensen’s exclamations of protest. “Yes, you certainly have a built for it,” he added, looking him up and down.

“In the habit of ogling other men, are you?” deadpanned Jensen, making Jared laugh.

Jensen was surprised to find that Jared had not been mistaken on that head. He loved riding at a full gallop and could give Jared a run for his money, an avid and experienced horseman though he was. He also turned out to be an excellent shot and after just a handful of boxing lessons with Jared and a few helpful hints from Daniel Mendoza’s _The Modern Art of Boxing_ managed to beat Jared hollow without so much as breaking a sweat.

It was then that he noticed a discoloured old scar standing out on his tanned upper arm. “A hunting accident,” said Jared dismissively. “I’m afraid that some of my acquaintances are not as good with a gun as I am.” Later it occurred to Jensen that he could not have gotten one over Jared so easily unless Jared had deliberately let him, thinking back in some bewilderment on how very merry he looked at being defeated, Jensen’s weight pinning him to the floor.

Jensen still refused to take a swim in the middle of winter, however mild, and naked into the bargain, but from time to time he couldn’t help wondering what it would feel like. Jared seemed to be very well pleased with the activity and always in excellent spirits upon his return from the pond. A reckless idea began to form in Jensen’s head then. Perhaps, he could sneak out to the pond before Jared got there and take a plunge unseen and undisturbed…

They spent most of their afternoons and evenings attending dinners, parties, music soirees, assemblies and private balls. By the end of the fortnight the whole neighbourhood was astonished by the change that had come over Jensen. “How carefree he is these days!” they would exclaim to one another in wonder. “How different are his manners now! So open and warm and easy. He is just what a young man of one and twenty ought to be. I declare, I barely know him now. Mrs Padalecki, you should have sent for Jared ages ago. It is without doubt his presence and influence that has transformed Jensen.”

Apparently, even his looks had undergone a material change. He had always been considered too beautiful to be true. However, his timidity, graveness, detachment and reserve made him rather cold and unapproachable, casting certain blight upon his character. But now he was chatting and smiling and laughing; his eyes were sparkling and crinkling at the corners and his beauty in its turn was radiant and breathtaking.

People conceded that he wasn’t as well-informed and worldly as Jared and could not talk of politics, poetry, theatre, art and fashion with the same ease and expertise, but general consensus was that he was so beautiful that just standing there looking pretty was enough for him.

“To tell you the truth,” said one young lady in a whisper to another as they walked arm in arm along the high street, “I am convinced that it is as it should be. It was only the other day that I was dared to come up to him and start a conversation. I do not even remember what it was that I asked him about – I was all aflutter to be near all that utter perfection – but when he started talking I could not for the life of me catch a word he said for all I could do was study the shape of his lips and the way they moved as he spoke.”

Her friend nodded fervently, clutching her hand. “My dear, I know exactly what you mean! Besides, his eyes being of such a fine shade of olive green and their expression so very intense when his gaze is trained upon you, one does not quite know where to look! Naturally, one’s eye travels to those mesmerizing lips, but once there, I fear, all thought is lost...”

They both sighed and hurried on.

But though Jensen and Jared attended every gathering in the neighbourhood, big or small, private or public, where dancing was required; and though between the two of them there wasn’t a single lady, ready to dance and be merry, who was left unattended for at least half an hour, no spark of attachment was ignited in either man’s breast; no sign of special preference was witnessed by watchful mothers and no lady felt upon herself that particular distinction in the manner of their address, the intimation of their looks or their fleeting touches that would merit a trip to London to look at the latest wedding gown fashions.

In fact, the only attachment that could be clearly discerned was rapidly growing attachment between Jensen and Jared. Jensen, for his part, felt as easy and comfortable with Jared as he remembered feeling in his childhood. In fact, they were getting on so well that Jensen often forgot that Jared was much older. Upon reflection, he decided that it could be easily accounted for by the fact that Jared never quite learnt to act his own age.

Jensen did not forget his intention to try and reform Jared should he find him the worst of rakes and he was still determined to check him the moment he saw that his actions went beyond what was generally termed as harmless flirtation. However, so far he had seen no signs of that.

*

It took Jensen several weeks to harden his resolve and finally go to the pond in the early hours of the morning. He’d calculated that half an hour before Jared’s usual time would suffice to reach the pond, have a swim and return to his chambers by taking a less travelled path without anyone being the wiser.

Consequently, upon setting off in the chilly greyish dawn of the appointed day, Jensen had to wonder whether it was his imagination or whether he’d chosen one of the coldest winter days to take a plunge. However, he didn’t turn back. That would be ignominious.

Having reached the pond and knowing that he could not afford to waste time, Jensen swiftly took off everything but his white shirt that hung loosely to his mid-thigh and placed his clothes in a neat pile on the bank, every now and again looking about himself with apprehension. After toeing the frozen ground for some time and shivering in the cold, Jensen berated himself for his idiocy and sternly told himself that there was no turning back.

Finally, he took a deep breath, shook his head and broke the surface of the dull-looking water at a run. It was beyond cold. It was beyond anything that he had ever known or felt. His body was in agony. It was pierced to the very marrow of his bones by sharp daggers made of ice. It burnt and stung and lashed as though the water was on fire. Jensen wanted to scream. He squeezed his eyes shut, gritted his teeth and fully submerged himself.

He was out of water as fast as a cannon-ball.

His legs would not support him. He crawled onto the bank, collapsing and shaking in his soaked shirt that was sticking unpleasantly to his body.

“Jensen, what in devil’s name possessed you to do that?” asked an amused voice from above.

Jensen started violently and opened his eyes. He groaned through his chattering teeth when he realized that he was lying at Jared’s feet. He tried to get up, to preserve some of his dignity, whatever he had left of, but his legs continued to be useless. Jared hauled him upwards and Jensen pressed into his body, seeking warmth within his embrace. He tried to speak but his tongue proved to be almost as useless as his legs.

“I w-w-wanted t-t-to try…” he stuttered.

Jensen could feel Jared shake his head.

“Idiot boy.”

“How d-d-did you k-n-n-now…?”

“My servant saw you walking across the grounds and informed me. I got curious and decided to see what was going on.”

“How c-c-can you d-d-do that? How c-c-can you d-d-do that every morning? It’s horrible…”

Jared chuckled before tightening his hold around Jensen.

“Maybe it’s just a ploy to lure pretty and gullible young men into my waiting arms?” he asked. “Have you considered that?”

“No, that c-c-can’t b-b-be it,” breathed out Jensen with a jerky shake of his head.

“No, of course not,” agreed Jared pleasantly. “Apparently, they willingly fall into my arms.”

“No, that’s not w-w-what I m-m-meant. I’m not s-s-sure w-w-what I m-m-meant… I c-c-can’t think s-s-straight… Jared, I’m c-c-cold…”

“Hush, love,” said Jared softly. “Let me take care of you.”

Sudden warmth flooded Jensen’s face and limbs. He thought that he must be coming down with a fever.

Jared instructed him to take off his wet shirt and gently but swiftly guided him through the process when Jensen found himself unable to do much but get stuck in the sleeves and the collar wide enough to accommodate a hippo. However, he was quite disoriented. Then Jared helped him to get dressed. Jensen, having regained some of his conscious thought process along with a modicum of warmth that had started coursing through his body when the first article of clothing covered his body, began to feel acute embarrassment.

“Do you want me to carry you, sweetheart?” asked Jared, sounding too earnest for Jensen’s ear, whose mortification was growing more with every second.

“Shut up, Jared,” he snapped but there was no heat behind his words.

Jared took Jensen, who was still shivering, to his own room. There he ordered him to get undressed and, after overriding Jensen’s vehement protests by pointing out that he could catch a severe cold, told him to get into bed.

Jensen decided that the best way to proceed under the circumstances was to be quick and efficient, and using the fact that Jared was busy pouring him a glass of brandy and stoking the fire, whisked under the covers, relieved that Jared hadn’t seen him naked again.

How great was his astonishment when after giving Jensen his brandy, Jared stripped himself of his own clothes and got into bed with him.

“Jared, what are you doing?!” cried Jensen, flushing and struggling against the covers that suddenly seemed intent on keeping him prisoner within their tangled folds.

“Keeping you warm, blockhead,” murmured Jared calmly, manhandling Jensen so that his back was pressed against his front.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” said Jensen quietly, suddenly too abashed to move.

“Why not?” asked Jared, putting his chin on Jensen’s shoulder and intensifying the feeling of burning heat radiating from his body.

“It doesn’t seem appropriate,” said Jensen even quieter. “We are practically naked with barely a sheet between us and we are sharing a bed.”

“We are practically brothers,” countered Jared. “I am merely helping you out by sharing my body heat with you.”

Jensen snorted. “Jared, how many brothers do you know who help each other by sharing their bed and body heat?”

Jared didn’t reply. A few seconds later Jensen felt a warm puff of air on the side of his neck and realized that Jared had fallen asleep, his arms and legs wound tightly around him.

Jensen felt that he would never get cold again.


	7. Chapter 7

His breathing had picked up pace and so had his heartbeat. Jensen felt as flushed as though he was indeed running a fever. Jared’s arms were heavy yet comforting and his strong legs were touching his own in such an intimate manner Jensen had trouble wrapping his mind around the notion. His body was pressed against the body of another man. He was held tightly in another man’s embrace! His bare skin was touching bare skin of another. Jensen squeezed his eyes shut, breathing rapidly through his nose, willing himself to relax, to accept Jared’s explanation that he was merely lending him his body heat, willing his own body to stop trembling with... what precisely? He could not quite tell.

They did not speak of it at breakfast. Jensen had dozed off at some point, no doubt lulled by the comfort and the heat surrounding him. But when he woke up, he panicked and fled. Jared thankfully did not comment on his cowardly retreat but greeted him with his usual wide grin. Their late arrival raised two sets of curious eyebrows and posed a number of questions that Jensen did not know how to deal with. He was sure that he would have lost his head entirely and confessed to the whole thing had his guardians continued to quiz him about it if Jared hadn’t stepped in and explained that he had convinced Jensen to join him for a morning swim, which, having exhausted them both by turning rather competitive, necessitated a few additional hours of repose.

Jensen was grateful to him but ashamed that he appeared to condone telling falsehoods to Mr and Mrs Padalecki. However, he had a more pressing matter on his mind. He had expected that being in the same room with Jared or looking him in the eye would be extremely uncomfortable from now on and was therefore astonished to discover that, barring his initial mortification and subsequent necessity to flee, he did not feel the urgent need to hide or look away when finding himself in his presence. In fact, the only urgent need that he had begun to experience was the need to be close to him. Jensen blamed Jared. Surely it was entirely his fault!

After all, he was the one who had brought warmth, comfort and intimacy of an embrace into his life. Mr and Mrs Padalecki were good and kind people and though affectionate not particularly demonstrative. Mrs Padalecki would take and squeeze Jensen’s hands in hers whenever she was overcome with emotions and Mr Padalecki would clap him on the back when unable to find words to express his excitement or approval but that was as far as their touches went. It suited Jensen’s own disposition for he condemned any and all physical displays of tenderness as unfortunate and indecent and taught himself to avoid them as weakness of the flesh unworthy of a man he had set out to become at the tender age of eleven.

Jared, on the other hand, was both affectionate and demonstrative and without any notion of personal space when engulfing Jensen within his frequent embrace. It became a matter of course for him to fling his arm around Jensen’s shoulders and hold him tight against his body or, upon coming up from behind, to wrap his arms around his waist, while putting his chin on Jensen’s shoulder in order to whisper something in his ear.

Jensen was too stunned to do anything about it at first and too polite to repel Jared, but in the course of time he began to expect, anticipate and even crave them. He knew it was wrong. He knew that it was the very sign of the weakness of the flesh that should have served him as a warning. However, it had only now begun to occur to him how extremely lonely he had been most of his life and of his own accord too.

He did not remember whether his mother had a habit of holding him in her arms for he’d made a point of banishing all memory of her out of his mind and heart. But his father certainly had. His father! His good, kind, excellent, heartbroken father! Jensen knew that he would not wish for his son to be deprived of affection and tenderness and warmth of another human being and yet it was for his father that he was trying so very hard not to fall prey to his mother’s perfidious science of carnal lust – and in order to do that self-mortification had to be practiced most zealously. However, it was not so easy to do now that Jared was constantly bestowing such liberal touches and caresses upon him.

*

It was one of those rare evenings that the whole family was spending at home, engaged in a friendly rubber of whist after dinner. They had just started playing when Mrs Padalecki, exchanging a meaningful look with her husband across the table, whom she partnered, thus began –

“Well, Jensen, dear, has any lovely female caught your eye yet?”

“And, why, pray do you not include me in your query, mother?” asked Jared in mock-indignation, glancing slyly at her over his cards. “After all, I am also on the market for a future wife.” He coughed upon catching Jensen’s skeptically raised eyebrow. “Or so I’ve heard.”

Mrs Padalecki scoffed. “Please, Jared, I would know right away if that happened. I have seen you head over heels in love many a time before. Jensen, however, has always been a closed book in this respect, and as I have never actually seen him enamoured with anyone, all I can do is use my right as his guardian and ask him as it is, in high hopes that he won’t prevaricate on the matter. But I know you too well, dear, to believe that you would,” she added softly.

Jensen inclined his head. “In that case, ma’am, I shall try not to disappoint,” he murmured, colouring slightly. “But to answer your query – no, no lovely female has caught my eye yet. Also, to foresee your next query – there are two main reasons for that. The first reason, I fear, is rather frivolous and I would not have mentioned it had you not charged me not to prevaricate. So here it is. I must confess that I have found myself having too much fun in Jared’s company to pay close attention to the ladies. He can be very distracting.”

Jared roared with laughter. “I cannot but share the sentiment. I derive so much pleasure from Jensen’s company I oftentimes forget that I should pay attention to anyone else.”

Mr Padalecki chortled. “The two of you have just reminded me of a conversation that I had not two days ago. Dr Pileggi came up to me and said that it looked as though the only person Jared had any intention of courting was Jensen.” Mr Padalecki was positively wheezing with laughter now. “Have you heard anything quite so droll, my dear? Such a droll man! Upon my word, I have never known him to possess any sense of humour before.”

Mrs Padalecki looked displeased. “Droll!” she cried. “Insufferable more like. He still cannot forget this business with his niece and tells whoever will listen to him that we treated them both abominably ill. However, that is of no import.” She took a deep breath. “Now, boys,” she said sternly; “I am excessively happy that you get on so extremely well. I could wish for nothing more. However,” she added gravely, “Jared, you cannot court Jensen. And, Jensen, you cannot marry Jared. God knows I prayed for your mother to give birth to a daughter. I thought she would be a perfect match for Jared and bring our families even closer together. However – ”

“I don’t know, mother, his features are quite delicate,” said Jared merrily. Jensen glared at him but it didn’t stop Jared as he continued, “I know for a fact that there isn’t a single female in the neighborhood who doesn’t envy his fair complexion, long eyelashes or plump lips. I dare say a few more prayers on your part would have done the trick.”

They all laughed. Jensen rolled his eyes but found that he was diverted rather than offended by the joke and readily joined in.

“But you mentioned two main reasons, didn’t you, Jensen, dear?” asked Mrs Padalecki at length.

“Indeed.” Jensen nodded, growing serious at once. “My second reason will probably be even less to your liking than my first. However, I will not conceal it from you. I haven’t mentioned my views on matrimony before but I guess now is as good a time as any.”

“Lord!” cried Mrs Padalecki. “What can it possibly be?”

“I’m afraid I have not yet met with that class of female who would correspond to my idea of a future wife.”

“I don’t understand what you mean, Jensen,” said Mrs Padalecki, sounding offended. “I believe we associate with the best families in the neighbourhood. I dare you to find so many excellent young ladies from good families in metropolis itself!”

Jensen nodded. “Indeed, ma’am. I completely concur. That is precisely what I mean. I find that they are too good for me.”

“Too good for you? But whatever do you mean? You are a son of a respectable man – ”

“ – and a fallen woman,” interjected Jensen.

“Jensen!”

Jensen shook his head, looking mulish. “Ma’am, what precisely is my claim on any young woman of good standing and fortune under these inauspicious circumstances?” he asked. “Any woman that will choose to unite her family with mine will have to share the burden of my disgrace; will be forever tainted by the knowledge of that shame that my mother had brought upon my name. An association with me will only degrade her. However, should I set my sights lower, I might yet do some good by elevating a poor girl with no fortune or connections from obscurity into gentility.”

“Gerald, do you hear it?” cried Mrs Padalecki, appealing to her husband. “Do you hear this heresy?”

“My dear,” replied Mr Padalecki calmly, “I think the boy talks some sense. At least, his mind does. His heart, on the other hand, does not yet know what it truly wants. However, give it time…”

“Gerald! It is all very well but how can you support this utter folly? He means to throw himself away!”

“Let him look wherever he wants, Sherri. You know how impressionable these young men can be. Nothing can dissuade them until they’ve either finally found what they have been looking for or have entirely given up on finding it.”

“I declare I’ve never met anyone as impressionable as Jensen,” replied Mrs Padalecki faintly.

“All the more reasons to let him marry me,” said Jared, who had been closely but silently following the scene until now; he was grinning mischievously. “In this case, he will not leave his sphere. And I promise to treat him well.”

The jest, unexpected and light-hearted, came as a welcome reprieve and everybody laughed again. Jensen, sighing with relief, gave Jared a grateful look and returned his attention to his cards.

It was such a well-established routine that right after the game everyone took their respective places like actors on the stage. Mr Padalecki sat in his chair next to the fire with a drink in his hand. Mrs Padalecki sat on the other side with her work basket, probably working on Jared’s handkerchiefs. Jensen took up another hefty volume of her favourite sentimental novel in letters and made himself comfortable on the sofa, while Jared, after finishing his own drink, made himself comfortable with his head in Jensen’s lap. No one batted an eyelid at such an arrangement.

From time to time Jared would vacate his place in order to pour Jensen a glass of wine. Jensen was somewhat vexed that he was treated like some delicate female and wasn’t offered the strong manly stuff that Jared and Mr Padalecki were drinking. ‘At least he didn’t mix it with water!’ he thought indignantly, eyeing Mrs Padalecki’s glass. However, he knew that it would have been extremely unwise to replace his wine with something stronger, because he was not used to imbibing spirits in the first place, and thoroughly disapproved of the habit in the second.

A few hours later Mr and Mrs Padalecki departed for the night, leaving Jensen and Jared alone; the servants had been dismissed right after dinner. Jensen closed the book with a sigh of relief, pushed it away across the table and took a grateful sip of his wine. He then closed his eyes and rolled his head back.

He didn’t realize that his fingers had been combing through Jared’s hair until Jared let out a loud moan of unmistakable contentment.

Jensen’s eyes flew open and his fingers stilled inches away from Jared’s head. He was horrified and mortified in equal degrees. He blamed the excess of wine. He wasn’t in his right mind. That was why he so thoroughly disapproved of the habit – a dangerous habit that erased all inhibitions clean out of one’s mind – but that so many gentlemen unfortunately indulged in.

“Why in devil’s name did you stop?” exclaimed Jared.

“I…”

Jensen cleared his throat and jerked his hand away as though Jared’s head was suddenly aflame. Jared looked up at him then, his head still in Jensen’s lap. Jensen looked away, agitated and confused. Jared let out a huff and grabbed the hand that had been caressing his hair not five seconds before. He then brought it to his lips. Jensen gasped and looked down just as Jared placed a soft kiss to the palm of his hand. Jared then laced their fingers together and put their intertwined hands on his chest. Jensen sat frozen, afraid to move, to breathe…

“You asked me a while back,” began Jared as though unaware of Jensen’s petrified state, “why I enjoyed your company so much; why I did not wish to lose it. I am a selfish man, Jensen. I am not a good man.” Jensen frowned at Jared’s words. Jared nodded. “I seek pleasure wherever I ago. I do not check my desires. I see no occasion for that. I am indolent and self-indulgent. I see an opportunity and I take it. I am reckless, careless, thoughtless, subversive.” A shiver ran down Jensen’s spine. Why was Jared telling him that? “Just like in the days of my youth. I haven’t changed much since then, I’m afraid. I made mistakes in the past – terrible mistakes – and yet I never owned up to them, never took the responsibility, never did the right thing. But I could tell straight away that you were different. Indeed, so very different. I was instantly drawn to you. I was drawn to your innocence, your purity, your bashfulness, your earnestness, your submission, your righteousness, your humility, your eagerness to do the right thing, your desire to please. I wished to be as near as possible to a thing of so much light and beauty; to a thing that is so hard to come by these days. I wanted to touch it… taste it… hold it… despoil it. Jensen, you have no idea how intoxicating you are…”

“Jared – ”

Jared’s fingers began to caress his. Jensen’s breath got caught in his throat and his head began to swim.

“Jared… is this… I mean… are you… are you courting me?” he stuttered, blushing furiously as he got the words out.

“Pray, what gave you that idea?” asked Jared in a lazy drawl.

Jensen blinked. “I’m not sure… I mean…”

“It was a rhetorical question, Jensen.”

“Oh.” Jensen felt extremely foolish and wrong-footed. He did not know what to do.

Jared’s head left his lap and Jensen’s hand fell limply to his side.

“I think you should go to bed,” said Jared abruptly, dismissively, sitting up and not looking at him.

“But – ”

“Jensen.”

Jared’s voice had suddenly become a low growl. Jensen lowered his troubled eyes and obeyed. He had never felt the disparity in their ages as acutely as at that moment.

As he flew up the stairs to his room, his head whirling and his heart thudding, he could not quite understand what had just happened.


	8. Chapter 8

Jensen was in agony. He did not know what had possessed him to pose such a terrible question. Could he blame the wine? Or, perhaps, all those compliments that Jared had so lavishly bestowed upon him had finally turned his head? Did it even matter in the end? No; whatever the reason, whatever the excuse that he could come up with to justify his actions, the only conclusion he could reach was that he was utterly rotten within. There could be no other explanation! After all, what other than corrupt must he be to discern something so unnatural, so wicked and so forbidden in the warmth and generosity of Jared’s manner towards him?

The man had been nothing but good, kind, friendly, attentive and solicitous to him; even his teasing was done with nothing but good humour, devoid of any ill intent behind it. No wonder he had become so cross! To act in so disgraceful a manner after all those excellent qualities and characteristics that Jared had ascribed to him! Jensen began to tremble in fear that there was no cure for his soul; that it was lost to salvation no matter what; that he would burn in hell. To accuse Jared of such an abominable thing! He must have been out of his mind with delirium. Jensen knew that come morning he would seek the man out and apologize; beg his forgiveness if need be.

He could barely eat any breakfast, waiting on tenterhooks for Jared’s arrival and looking up every now and again from his untouched plate, wide-eyed and terrified, in the direction of the door whenever he heard the sound of footsteps outside. However, Jared never made an appearance. Finally, growing tired of waiting, Jensen left the breakfast-parlour and went to the entrance hall where, upon commenting on Jared being unusually tardy from his morning swim, he was informed by the butler that Master Jared (he never stopped calling him that even though Jared was not a child anymore) had left at the crack of dawn.

Jensen blinked in astonishment and as he watched the old servant bow and walk away decided that there had been some mistake. Surely Jared could not leave just like that! He shook his head and fully convinced that he was right instantly resolved to go down to the pond, expecting to meet Jared either on his way back to the house or still in the water. Jensen would have naturally preferred to meet Jared fully clothed. However, he was ready to face the alternative, feeling that he had injured the other man to such a degree that whatever discomfort and mortification he was about to encounter would be a most just punishment.

But neither the path leading towards the pond nor the pond itself presented him with the sight of Jared. Growing uneasy and less certain in his conviction, Jensen went to the stable-yard. The carriage was there but Jared’s favourite horse was gone; upon enquiry, the groom confirmed that Jared was the one who had taken it. Jensen felt himself suddenly lost, almost bereaved. This was the first time in weeks that he was left behind without so much as a warning on Jared’s part.

Alas, he knew that he had no one to blame but himself.

Mr and Mrs Padalecki were quite perplexed by their son’s unexpected departure and Jensen bore the additional guilt of being the one to have caused it but unable to tell them the truth. He could not bear to look into their concerned faces and listen to their speculations without feeling like the basest of creatures. Mrs Padalecki said that Jared would ride off as a youth all the time but that he had grown quite steady since then and it was very unlike him to do so now. Mr Padalecki patted her on the back of her hand, told her not to fret and assured her with his inherent composure and geniality that he would be back by dinner time. “Mark my words, dear!” Jensen fled their presence as soon as he could without arising any suspicions. However, they could not help noticing how very subdued he was, justly attributing his low spirits to Jared’s absence.

Jensen returned to his room, deciding to spend the disengaged morning hours perusing the texts on theology, morality and religion as was his habit in the days of yore. However, it suddenly struck him that by touching the sacred volumes he would taint them with the impurity of his thoughts. He recoiled from them and left the room at a run. He had let the snake of sin into his soul. He could no longer go back to the ways things used to be. He went outside and decided to take a ride, but feeling an instant painful pang at the thought that his usual riding companion had deserted him, resolved to roam the grounds on foot instead, thinking and reflecting and heaping burning coals of shame on his head, having nothing else to apply himself to. _‘Activity enables a man to escape from himself; for he who looks much abroad does not look much within,’_ he thought grimly, recollecting the lines he never truly understood until now.

It was a long dull morning filled with unrest and fitful actions and the afternoon seemed to last interminably long. At dinner they all sat in palpable anticipation of Jared’s return and were all beyond disappointed when he didn’t walk through the doors, tall and loud, with his arms outstretched in warm welcome and his face split into a wide grin. They removed themselves to the drawing-room to be quiet and forlorn, Mr Padalecki with his evening glass of brandy and a paper, Mrs Padalecki with her work, and Jensen with her favourite book in his hands. Upon the conclusion of their usual evening activities, Jensen felt drained and yet filled with restless energy at the same time.

He did not wish to go to his room and on a whim, he could not explain nor did he care to investigate too closely in his present state of extreme perturbation of mind, went to Jared’s room instead. He knew not the purpose of such a venture or what it could accomplish and hastily concealed himself in the corner like a thief when the maid came in to light the fire in order to keep the room warm in case of her master’s late return. After her departure, Jensen took a seat in an armchair and continued to ponder the matter that had brought him thither, his thoughts gradually mutating, and in his anger and hurt turning against Jared with ferocity and venom Jensen never knew he possessed within his soul.

His posture stiff, his lips pursed and his fingers clenched together in his lap, he was staring with unseeing eyes into the fire when the door to the room opened and Jared finally came in.

Jensen stiffened even more and narrowed his eyes.

“Hello, Jared,” he said dryly. “Where were you all day?”

He watched with grim satisfaction as Jared jumped a few inches in the air, whirled around, hit his foot, yelped, overturned a footstool, landed on his backside and let out a long and colourful string of curses before addressing him.

“Jensen!” he cried. “What the devil are you doing skulking in the shadows like that? You very nearly scared me to death!”

“Oh?” asked Jensen in a hollow voice. “I’m sure I didn’t mean to. I dare say just like you didn’t mean to leave without informing anyone of your intentions or possible whereabouts.”

Jared got up, brushed himself off and swore again.

“Jensen – ” he began but stopped abruptly when Jensen leapt to his feet and rushed towards him with an accusatory finger pointing right at his face.

“I was out of my mind with worry,” he hissed, baring his teeth and glaring at Jared in the orange glow of the flames in the grate. “I wanted to tell you how sorry I was for my unbecoming conduct and for the ill-advised words that I spoke. For all I knew I had offended you so much that you didn’t want to be in the same room with me – you wouldn’t even look at me!”

“Jensen – ”

“I was waiting for you at breakfast! I was waiting for you in the hall! I went looking for you in the grounds! I was ready to grovel at your feet until you forgave me. But you were gone! Not a note, not a word – nothing! What was I supposed to think? That I drove you out of your own house with my foolishness? You promised that we would be constant companions and yet you weren’t there. I was left on my own with my thoughts – awful, awful, awful thoughts; berating, castigating, tormenting myself over and over again! I am not used to that, Jared.”

He shook his head just as a shudder went through his body.

“I do not know what is happening with me. I do not understand why I am besieged with all these strange questions and doubts. I do not know how to deal with them. I never felt like this before. How just are the lines: _Unless we restrain appetite, and check the workings of caprice, we are feeble, and we must be wretched._ I was wretched, Jared. I needed you! I – ”

“Jensen – ”

“Don’t – don’t do that again,” said Jensen fiercely, tears shining in his eyes, his breathing harsh and loud.

Jared cupped his face in his hands and looked him in the eye as Jensen continued to breathe furiously through his nose.

“Jensen, listen to me. You have nothing to apologize for,” he told him. “Do you hear me? Nothing! You haven’t done or said anything wrong. You did not offend me. You could not. I was at fault. I was to blame. I caused all that confusion and distress that overpowered your mind and I am sorry that I wasn’t there to alleviate their effects. I barely know my own mind at times. I didn’t think of the impact that which had transpired would have upon you. I told you that I am a selfish man. I think I proved it admirably. Or should I say despicably?”

“Where were you?” asked Jensen, unconsciously leaning into Jared’s touch. He had never known how much he enjoyed being touched or held until… But it made perfect sense, didn’t it? He was just like his mother. He was vicious and wanton by nature and easy prey to pleasures of the flesh.

Jared hesitated before replying, “I had a pressing matter I had to attend to. It was… a matter of some urgency.”

“What pressing matter? You never mentioned it.”

“It came up suddenly. It matters not now. It was dealt with.”

“You were gone the whole day,” accused Jensen.

“Yet here I am,” replied Jared with some of his customary cheer back. “I have returned.”

Jensen stared at him with narrowed eyes for a long moment. Then he asked the thing that had been torturing him the most –

“So you don’t hate me then?”

“Hate you?” Jared shook his head; his hands still on either side of Jensen’s flushed face. “Jensen, I could never hate you.”

Jensen nodded, relieved, pleased. “May I spend the night here?” he blurted out before he could stop himself. His eyes widened at his uncharacteristic forwardness just as stubbornness set in, hardening his resolve.

“Jensen – ”

“Please?” Jensen looked beseechingly at Jared, putting his hands on top of his and holding tight. “You said yourself that we’re practically brothers and that we are there for each other. It has been a bad day for me, Jared. I don’t want to be left alone with my thoughts anymore. They scare me with the things they reveal about who and what I am. If you sent me away now, I will know that you lied about not hating or blaming or at least despising me.”

Jared took a deep breath, as though steeling himself for something momentous, but nodded. “Get in then. I’ll join you shortly.”

Jensen did as he was told. He took off his shoes, untied his necktie and unbuttoned his waistcoat and breeches as swiftly as his shaking fingers would allow him; then, remaining in his shirt, climbed under the covers so that only the upper part of his face was visible. He could barely make out Jared’s movements in the dark, distorted as they were by swooping shadows. His heart was thudding in his throat at his own audaciousness and perverseness.

As soon as Jared got into bed, Jensen scrambled towards him and snuggled against his chest, so broad and warm, tucking his face in the crook of his neck, yet fully relaxing only when Jared put his arms around him. Jensen sighed. Jared dropped a soft kiss onto his forehead. It was such a fatherly gesture that Jensen felt obliged to observe, “I am not a child, Jared.” He didn’t need to be mollycoddled!

Jared chuckled. “It is a matter of opinion.”

Jensen was already half-asleep when he was startled awake by a rumble that shook Jared’s chest. It took him a few seconds to realize that Jared was chuckling.

“Jared,” he asked through a huge yawn, “what is so droll that it cannot wait till morning? I am trying to sleep here, you know.”

“I swear for a moment there I felt as though I was already married. I mean the way you went on harping and attacking me!”

Jensen flushed. “Shut up, Jared.”

“Yes, my lady.”

“I am not your lady!”

“Well, you certainly could have fooled me. You caused quite a scene when I came home late and now we are sharing a bed. I don’t know… it all seems very… matrimonial to me.”

Jensen began to fight against his embrace but Jared just held him tight to his chest.

“Hush, love,” he murmured lightly, pressing another kiss to the top of his head. “Don’t fret. I don’t mind having such a young and pretty wife.”

Jensen went still in his arms at once, reminding himself that Jared was merely teasing him, and that it would be extremely silly to leave the warmth and comfort of his bed on so trifling grounds.

“Feisty and yet obedient,” murmured Jared complacently. “Indeed, I do not mind one bit.”


	9. Chapter 9

As many wondrous hopes of the ladies of the neighbourhood to set cap at either Jensen or Jared began to wane, many of them began to turn their eye towards London for there was still time to partake of its season. Mrs Padalecki, sharing in some of their disappointment, for she had also hoped to welcome at least one daughter into the family ere long, and wishing to soothe their disgruntled spirits over the ruin of all their matrimonial plans, decided that a ball held at the manor was in order.

In fact, Mrs Padalecki believed that they had not held a ball at the manor for so long that it was high time to polish its spacious ballroom floor and fill its slumbering halls with merry sounds of the fiddle, laughter and eagerly stomping feet. The preparations alone, she was certain, would restore good will among the neighbours and occupy their heads with something other than ill-natured rumours and far-fetched conjectures.

The day was soon set, the invitations were sent out and the frenzy of the preparations began. The local seamstresses, milliners, cobblers and haberdashers had their hands particularly full at that exciting time. However, there was one young man who cared little for finery or fashion and saw no occasion to alter the style of his dress or hair for something so frivolous and transient as a ball. Jensen was quite impassive about the whole thing until Jared took it upon himself to inspect his wardrobe and choose his outfit for him.

Thus, one day Jensen was to be found reclining in his chair with a small smile on his face while his shirts, cravats, waistcoats, tailcoats and shoes were pronounced utterly unfit for anything.

Jared’s over-the-top reaction greatly amused him.

“I wonder why you should comment on their unfitness now when you see me wearing them every day of the week?” he asked.

Jared paused.

“That is a fair question, my friend,” he replied at length, looking thoughtfully at Jensen. “I can only assume that your fine figure and your pretty face present the whole thing in the most favourable light, giving it a positive aspect, you know. For let us be fair: who thinks of what you are wearing when looking at you?”

Jensen, no matter how often Jared complimented him on his looks, could never stop himself from blushing, even though he was well aware that Jared took particular delight in teasing him and seeing a flush of embarrassment stain his cheeks.

“However, once your clothes are separated from your person, they are nothing but an assortment of drab and ugly things that should not be allowed in good society – let alone worn to a ball.”

“Surely you exaggerate!”

Jared raised an eyebrow.

“I can assure you I do not.”

Jensen shook his head.

“You do remember that I intended to enter the holy orders?”

Jared looked askance at him.

“I do not see what it has got to do with this abomination that you call clothes.”

“Oh, a mere trifle, I am sure! I simply did not think it right for a future clergyman to strut around dressed like a peacock, flaunting the latest fashions.”

“So! In other words, you wished to impress your future flock with holy terror at the ghastly sight instead. Well, you shall get rid of them at once! I shall brook no arguments from you on that head. Give them to the poor if you must – that might not be the kindest thing to do, I grant you that, but beggars cannot be choosers, after all.”

“And then what? Walk around naked until the new ones arrive?”

Jensen could have swallowed his tongue the moment the words left his mouth. Jared’s eyes had instantly acquired a mischievous gleam. He was on the point of saying something no doubt salacious when Jensen cut across him with a plea –

“Don’t! I beg you! I shall get rid of them as long as you forget I ever said anything!”

Jared’s face split into a slow grin. “Why, Jensen, I do not know what you mean,” he drawled, making Jensen roll his eyes in disbelief. “Indeed, I was merely going to point out that it would not be the most prudent course of action for upon seeing you walking around naked ancient gods would no doubt become so jealous of your beauty they would strike you down with their wrath and turn you into a toad or some such nasty little thing with warts and whatnot in order to punish you for your vanity and arrogance.”

Jensen was laughing by the time Jared had finished his speech. “I cannot believe the words leaving your mouth sometimes,” he said, shaking his head and rubbing tears of mirth out of his eyes.

“However, a promise is a promise!” declared Jared solemnly as he began to throw Jensen’s clothes out of the closet, scattering them higgledy-piggledy across the floor.

“Well, this is a pretty mess that you’ve made here,” said Jensen with another shake of his head when Jared was done with the destruction of his meagre collection of clothes, walking through the wreckage with a thoughtful expression. “I’m sure you could have spared my shirts at least. I doubt they differ very much from your own.”

“I might have got carried away,” admitted Jared with a shrug, eliciting a snort from Jensen. “We can always tell the maid to put it all away or separate the shirts from the rest of the clothes when she will be gathering them to take to the poor. Now!”

He turned to face Jensen with such a predatory expression on his face that Jensen felt a shiver run down his spine and promptly made a step back.

“Jared, allow me to tell you that I do not like that look,” he stammered. “What is it that you are planning now?”

He continued to back away for Jared continued to advance upon him.

“I mean to send a note to my old tailor in London and immediately place an order with him, of course,” replied Jared conversationally. “However, I need to take your measurements first. Not to mention that we still haven’t gotten rid of every bit of clothing that you own. Did you think I would forget about those items that you still have on you?”

“I thought it mattered not what I wore when it was on me,” muttered Jensen, at last backed right into the wall. “Besides, since when have you become qualified to take measurements? I do not recall you ever being apprenticed to a tailor.”

“One does not have to be a tailor or his apprentice in order to know how to do that, Jensen.” Jared had now placed himself in front of Jensen with very little room to spare between them. Jensen’s chest began to expand with the rapidity of his shallow breath. “I shall be happy to demonstrate what an expert I am,” whispered Jared wickedly, a mere breath away from Jensen’s face.

Jensen’s eyes widened. “I’m sure it is not necessary…”

“Let me be the judge of that.”

Jared placed his hands on Jensen’s shoulders and lazily traced his collarbone.

“Nice, broad, strong shoulders…” he said with an appreciative look and a nod of a true connoisseur.

“Don’t you...” Jensen cleared his throat and tried again. “Don’t you need a tape-measure?”

“Don’t you trust my judgment?”

Jensen let out a bark of breathless laughter.

“Not one bit,” he murmured, willing himself not to tremble at the other man’s teasing touch.

Jared hummed under his breath and slid his hands downwards, smoothing his palms across Jensen’s chest, trailing them along his sides, his touch as light and ticklish as a feather, before settling his hands on his waist, his fingers long, strong and hot.

Jensen tried to stay utterly still, not to show how much Jared’s touch was affecting him, praying that his body would not betray him.

“Hmmm… what a fine waist you’ve got. I dare say it is as slim as a female’s. However, just to make sure…”

Jared wrapped his fingers around Jensen’s waistline and squeezed, making Jensen gasp.

“Indeed. Just as I said. I see you favour breeches,” continued Jared, relaxing his grip and looking very smug. “Ugly things if you ask me. Quite out of fashion too, don’t you know?”

“And what precisely is your quarrel with them?” asked Jensen not without amusement, even though his heart was beating too fast to let him fully enjoy the situation.

“I suppose my quarrel with them is the same as that of any sensible gentleman of taste and fashion. They are baggy and coarse and conceal so much natural perfection.” He let his hands slide lower as though quite unintentionally. “We should order you some pantaloons instead. There will be no bagginess there for they will fit like second skin and will show off your legs.”

His hands continued to roam. Jensen adamantly shook his head.

“I don’t want to look like a fop, Jared.”

“Well…” Jared considered the matter. “Buckskin breeches then. They will sit tightly enough, I suppose.”

Jensen tried not to think about the fact that Jared was studying his physiology below the waistline with keen interest, occasionally brushing his fingers against his hips and thighs. However, he couldn’t help gasping when Jared had placed his large palm on that part of his anatomy that he was so desperately trying to keep in check.

“By the by, what is your view on French fly?” asked Jared lightly, apparently supremely unconcerned by the fact that he was causing a great deal of discomfort and embarrassment by the rubbing motion of his hand. “It will go right in the centre. Like so.” He demonstrated by slowly drawing his index finger up and down the front of Jensen’s breeches, making Jensen press himself into the wall and away from that treacherous touch.

Jensen clamped his lips together as though he was seasick and only shook his head.

“No? Oh well! A front fall it is then,” said Jared swiftly. “However, I absolutely insist on the narrow fall instead of the wide one. The narrow fall will go from hip-bone to hip-bone, you see,” he demonstrated again with his deftly moving fingers, “rather than from hip to hip.”

Jensen swallowed. His body was taut and trembling after Jared had paid particular attention to his hipbones. In fact, he was still feeling the phantom of his caress.

“Jared,” he whispered. “I think – ”

“Of course,” exclaimed Jared, interrupting him, “we still need to decide what you will be wearing to the ball. Well! How about we take a ride – the weather is fine and you look rather flushed – and then I will see what I can spare from my own wardrobe. Let us not waste time then. I do not know why but winter afternoons have a tendency to finish before they even begin, taking all the sun and warmth with them.”

Jared had been right; the weather was indeed rather fine not to avail oneself of the opportunity to enjoy it. Of course, in consequence of their intense tete-a-tete, Jensen was more than relieved to put some distance between himself and the older man, and as soon as they reached the spacious downs, launched his horse into a full gallop to clear his head and calm down those palpitations, stirrings, thrummings, throbbings and other disturbing sensations that were presently coursing through his body.

Jensen was well aware that for Jared this was just a game – a manner in which one might pass the time in the country out of boredom – and it was plain that he was indulging himself in it selfishly, carelessly and thoughtlessly, without restrain or impunity. For Jensen, however, it was quite real and he knew not what to do about it, how to safeguard himself against its affect upon himself, or how to give it up. It was his utter destruction. He had never been close with another person before. He had prudently rejected the demands of the flesh as unwanted and unnecessary and fully resolved upon entering matrimony to do his duty by his wife on their wedding night and beget an heir but no more.

He had never thought that he would allow this sort of intimacy – so wanton, so indecent, so wrong, so unnatural – let alone seek or crave it! He would have never imagined or believed that he would let a man touch him in ways and places that Jared seemed to need no permission to. Jensen told himself that if Jared treated anyone else in such a manner, he would interfere; he would check Jared’s progress before any damage could be done. However, he thought that he deserved to suffer unfulfilled yearnings and painful remorse under Jared’s ministrations for being weak and wicked; not to mention that a large part of him relished the perdition.

Upon their return from the ride and after having taken some refreshments in the drawing-room on Mrs Padalecki’s insistence, they adjourned to Jared’s room, where Jensen’s torture by touch continued.

He noticed that Jared treated his own clothes with as little ceremony as he had treated Jensen’s, but that his own varied greatly in colour, ornament, fabric and cut. His shirts were both ruffled and not, his waistcoats ranged from dark burgundy to canary yellow and his tailcoats came in all shades of red, blue, green and brown. They were decorated with golden and silver threads and some had precious stones sown into them. He even had extremely tight satin and velvet evening breeches that Jensen was obliged to put on in order to see how much taking in they required if he wished to wear them to the ball.

Jensen was turned and twirled, prodded and pawed, buttoned and unbuttoned, touched and caressed; his sleeves were bound and unbound around his wrists again and again, and he lost count and forgot names of all the different knots that Jared tied around his neck, never losing an opportunity to gently stroke it and pronounce it the finest neck he had ever seen. Jensen submitted to his ministrations and expertise and made no complains or objections. He was ashamed to admit how much he enjoyed being the centre of Jared’s world.

That night he once again crawled into Jared’s bed, sighing when the latter instantly slipped his arms around him, drew him close to himself and placed a soft kiss on top of his head. Then, as he was drifting off to sleep, Jensen could have sworn that he felt a ghostly touch of Jared’s lips on the nape of his neck.


	10. Chapter 10

The ball was a most joyous affair and while it confirmed what everyone had suspected all along – that no two ladies had been so fortunate as to secure two of the most eligible bachelors in the neighbourhood – everyone greatly enjoyed themselves. Perhaps, due to the fact that now that they did not anticipate being distinguished by either man, beyond the most common flirtation that must and will take place at a ball, young women of the assembly conducted themselves in а manner free of those ceremonies and constraints usually put upon them when in pursuit of a man, which, naturally, contributed to a much happier pastime on all sides.

Jensen and Jared did not miss a single dance, indefatigably leading one partner after another onto the crowded floor, and were so merry and gallant that no lady was left feeling neglected or offended by lack of notice or attention on their part; and so pleased by their manners and so charmed by their smiles they all were that at the conclusion of the ball felt as happy as though all their most ardent matrimonial wishes had already been granted.

The guests did not leave until the early hours of the morning and when Jensen finally found himself in bed, head spinning, eyes struggling to keep focus, movements languid and absent, grin stretching his mouth from ear to ear and body tingling from the tips of his toes to the top of his head, it occurred to him that he must be, in fact, inebriated for the first time in his life. He fell into bed with a giggle and a hiccough (after being helped out of his clothes and shoes by the servant) and buried his head into the soft pillow in utter bliss…

He was winding his way through darkened halls of impending sleep when his bed moved with a distinct wobble, followed by a muffled oath, which informed him, to his bewilderment, that in his attempt to join him, Jared had somehow missed and ended up on the floor instead. Jensen giggled once more, thinking that Jared must be quite intoxicated too.

“I swear I do not remember your bed being this high before,” grunted Jared as he climbed in, his tongue having difficulty producing all the words without distorting them in one manner or another.

Jensen heard him pant and curse some more before he finally managed to find his ungainly way under the covers, one of his hands landing heavily on Jensen’s back. Jensen, feeling the heat coming from Jared’s body, instinctively scooted over. He was ready to resume his journey into the realm of dreams, tired as he was, when Jared grabbed his buttocks – squeezing and kneading them.

His eyes flew open. “Jared!” he hissed. “What are you – ?”

“I bet you have no idea,” murmured Jared, slightly slurring the words, “how exceptionally hard it is to keep my hands off that delicious part of yours so temptingly displayed for my view every single day… I wish you could know how delectable you look riding a horse. How often I follow behind just so I could have a proper look. How many a time I wished I could just – ”

Jensen gasped and felt his eyes bulge out when he felt Jared’s mouth plant tiny pebbles of forbidden kisses all over his backside. The unutterable wrongness of the act stunned him into numbness. He could not speak. His voice – his reason – his ability to protest – they all disappeared, scattered by the horrific notion of Jared’s mouth, tongue and teeth, that soon followed, bestowing teasing licks and sharp bites, on that particular part of his anatomy.

Jared stretched the fabric of his nightshirt across his buttocks next and dipped his nose between his butt-cheeks, rubbing it up and down... Jensen squeezed his eyes shut and buried his burning face deeper into the pillow, clutching it like a lifeline, unable to fight the tremors that shook his body, refusing to believe.

“Jared, please stop…” he begged at last. “…this is madness… you’re scaring me…”

The sinful pressure against his cleft ceased at once and a soothing hand on his back made him jump right into Jared’s arms.

“Jensen, Jensen… forgive me,” whispered Jared contritely, pressing Jensen to his chest and cradling him like a child, his head resting in the nook between his neck and shoulder. “It appears that I have lost my head.”

Jensen drew a shuddering breath and opened his eyes. “We should get some sleep,” he said in a small voice.

Jared nodded and maneuvered them both in a horizontal position, back to chest, never letting Jensen go; the palm of his hand pressed like a searing brand of ownership against Jensen’s abdomen.

*

Jensen woke up some time later still held tightly in Jared’s arms and discovered much to his horror that he had a certain problem that he had to deal with before Jared woke up and noticed his body’s mischief. However, as soon as he began to move, attempting to shift himself across the bed and away from the other man, Jared began to stir behind him and Jensen became aware that he had a similar problem.

His nightshirt must have ridden upwards at some point during sleep and it was a shock that left him wide-eyed and open-mouthed to feel Jared’s hardening length rubbing against his naked flesh, slipping in between his cheeks and fitting there as snugly as though it belonged there.

Jensen’s face burnt and his problem was growing more urgent when Jared awoke with a groan and dropped his head in between Jensen’s shoulder blades.

“How much did I have to drink at my dear mother’s ball?” he rasped. “I swear my mouth tastes like butt.”

A bubble of hysterical laughter threatened to erupt from Jensen’s constricted chest. “That would be an apt description, I dare say,” he replied as dryly as he could manage under the circumstances.

“What do you mean? Truly, how drunk was I?” asked Jared in apparent bewilderment.

Taking heart from the fact that Jared didn’t seem to have the memory of the event he had alluded to, Jensen said, “Jared, you were so drunk you decided to use my backside as a pillow.”

He made sure to sound properly reproachful and horrified, expecting Jared to feel the very wrongness of his conduct and repent.

“Indeed? Well! That’s an exceptionally fine backside,” said Jared without a trace of either embarrassment or shame. “I would have to be blind not to conjure fantasies about it.”

Jensen gritted his teeth, knowing perfectly well where Jared’s eyes were now fixed upon. “I know you don’t mean it,” he said softly. “I know well that you take pleasure in teasing me.”

He shifted slightly onto his stomach so as to hide the evidence of Jared’s effect on him. However, Jared’s hand was still pressed against his abdomen from where it was spreading warmth throughout his entire body, and by moving ever so slightly was likewise sending jolts of heat there where presently it was most unwelcome.

“I believe I take pleasure in great many things when it comes to you,” whispered Jared, beginning to move behind him again.

“ _Human beings are not born to trifle, and to please themselves only_ ,” quoted Jensen breathlessly.

“That is why I wish to please you in the first place,” murmured Jared in reply.

Jensen jerked upwards so violently when Jared’s hand inched lower that he would have left the room through the ceiling had Jared not been pinning him down.

“Jared, stop,” he hissed, trembling when Jared’s fingers started playing casually with his pubic hair, giving an impression that it was as natural a thing as anything. “You know it’s wrong.”

“I know nothing of the kind,” rejoined Jared, never stopping moving against him, his whole body pressed against Jensen’s like a fiery shield.

He kept moving his hand further down.

“Don’t... don’t touch it,” entreated Jensen when he realized where exactly it was going.

“Do you want to do it yourself?” murmured Jared silkily.

“What? No!” cried Jensen, appalled. “I don’t – I never – ”

“Never! Good Lord!”

“It goes away then,” mumbled Jensen.

Jared shook his head. “I’m sorry, Jensen, I cannot leave it like that.”

His long, strong fingers wrapped around Jensen’s cock before Jensen could say another word. Jensen’s whole being was suddenly concentrated on that hand doing wicked things to his flesh.

“That’s it, love,” encouraged Jared, moving his fingers up and down. “Don’t fight it. Don’t deny yourself the pleasure.”

He put his other palm on Jensen’s chest, then brought one of his knees between his thighs and lifted him up. Jensen’s eyes bulged out and he began to pant loudly through his nose when the pressure and the pace instantly increased. His cock was on fire; gripped and teased and rubbed and squeezed and scratched; his slit tickled, his balls rolled around like dice in Jared’s giant hand. On and on and on it went…

… his ears were filled with ringing noise, growing higher and higher in pitch as Jared continued to pump his cock in his fist. Jensen could feel his muscles contract, his body rocking and bucking and shaking, drops of sweat gathering on his forehead, on the back of his neck; as the throbbing inside of him grew, he began to rut in desperate need against Jared’s hold.

“That’s right, sweetheart,” panted Jared in his ear. “You’re almost there, aren’t you? I can feel it…”

Jensen could feel it too. The rush of release was roaring in his ears and clawing its way through him, ready to burst forth at any moment. He was leaking and quaking and thrashing and begging “ _More, more, more…”_ before all turned white and strings of his release coated Jared’s fingers and spurted onto the sheet.

His breathing was loud and shallow, his heart was pounding in his chest, his limbs were trembling, his stomach quivering and his softened cock was sticky and raw yet occasionally twitching with phantasms of pleasure still coursing through it. His sweat-drenched forehead was pressed into the crumpled sheet beneath him and he was mortified to realize that his butt was thrust shamelessly into the air in some obscene sort of display.

Jared was panting loudly behind him, one of his hands sinking painfully into Jensen’s side, the other, apparently, fiercely working his own cock to completion. He was hissing and cursing and urging himself, his hips were jerking backwards and forwards and his cock was slapping Jensen’s spread cheeks as he sped up, smearing them with drops of come – and when he finally released his load, he came all over Jensen.

Jensen instinctively propelled himself forward, away from the terrifying wrongness of what they had done.

Jared’s slippery hands instantly grabbed his hips and tucked him back to himself so that Jensen ended up sitting in his lap.

“Jensen,” he growled when the younger man began to struggle against his hold, “compose yourself!”

Jensen shook his head. “We shouldn’t have done it, Jared. We shouldn’t have done it. We shouldn’t have...”

Jared hushed him and pressed him to his heaving chest and called him sweetheart and kissed his bare shoulder, where his nightshirt had slipped, exposing it.

“I will take care of you, love. I will take care of you.” He tenderly laid him down on his back. “I will be right back. Do not move.”

Jensen didn’t. He stared at the canopy of Jared’s four-poster, breathing heavily through his nose, trembling with the enormity of what had come to pass, expecting some horrible punishment to befall him momentarily. He had indulged his carnal lust. He had pleasured himself. He had committed a terrible sin with another man!

“Let’s clean you up a bit, shall we?” asked Jared softly, making him start nonetheless. He gently lifted Jensen’s nightshirt and began to smooth a cool cloth over the sensitive flesh of his cock, his balls, between his thighs, eliciting tremors and gasps in the process.

_“Shhh... Shhh... Shhh…”_

Having finished with that part, Jared nudged Jensen slightly onto his side and erased the traces of his own release from his body. He returned to the washstand to rinse the cloth and cleaned himself next. After that, he slipped back into bed and took Jensen into his arms. Jensen sniffed.

“There is nothing to be ashamed of,” Jared assured him. “Tell me, have you enjoyed yourself?”

Jensen shifted restlessly in his arms but didn’t reply.

“Oh no, don’t be coy with me now. I have seen that utter abandonment with which you took pleasure in the act.”

Jensen trembled. “Jared, please...” He bit on his bottom lip; it was salty with sweat and it burnt where he had bitten through it at some point. When did it happen? He could not recall.

“Don’t be ashamed,” coaxed Jared.

“Then don’t make me speak of it!”

Jared sighed. “Very well. I shall indulge you. For now. I dare say it has been quite a shock…”

He carded his fingers through Jensen’s mussed hair, tugging at sticky with sweat locks, wrapping them around his index finger, bringing to Jensen’s mind the way he played with his pubic hair before. Jensen flushed crimson and banished the thought. Had he always been this corrupt?

They fell silent but as he looked in the direction of the window, where a sliver of bright morning light was breaking through the narrow opening in the drapes, Jensen felt suddenly sick. What if someone had heard them while they were engaged in their forbidden activities? They had not been discreet or particularly quiet. What if Jared’s parents had heard them and came to check what was going on? What if one of the servants had entered to check the fires or something without their noticing, engrossed as they were? What would happen then? Would they be exposed, taken to prison, tried, hanged?

Jensen took a deep breath. He had to calm down! His worries could be completely groundless. After all, their rooms were situated next to each other with a door connecting them and it was that door that they used to sneak into each other’s beds. So really there was no reason for anyone to know of their unusual sleeping arrangements in the first place. Jensen kept no valet and Jared’s own came only when his master rang the bell. The other servants in the house likewise didn’t have the habit of coming to their rooms uninvited.

However, just to be sure, he wanted to know Jared’s opinion on the matter. Jensen was just about to voice the question aloud when Jared said, “I wish to go to London.”

Jensen frowned just as his insides grew suddenly cold. “Why?” he asked sharply, sitting up in bed with his back turned firmly to Jared. “Do you no longer find local diversions sufficiently satisfying?”

He felt that Jared’s sudden desire to go to metropolis was a direct commentary on his performance, on his inadequacy, on his failure to gratify.

Jared must have felt that he had said something wrong, because he sat up as well and turned a rather reluctant Jensen to face him.

“I wish you to go with me, Jensen,” he said. “I wish us to go together. I want to get away from my parents... from their control… everything! I want us to take up a house there with a minimum number of servants and proceed to explore that which we had begun here – undisturbed.”

Jensen stared at him with slightly narrowed eyes but, finding his expression earnest, nodded before smiling archly at him. “I believe that if I were a young lady my sharing a bed and going to town with you without marrying you first would mean my utter ruin.”

Jared smirked and took Jensen’s hand in his; slowly, he kissed each knuckle, his gaze never leaving Jensen’s.

“I believe that if you were a young lady, Jensen, I would marry you as soon as the banns were read. I would then take you to my bed and ravish you until you wouldn’t know your own name.”

Jensen blushed.


	11. Chapter 11

They were all assembled in the drawing-room that evening when Jared brought up the subject of London. He was sitting at his ease on the sofa, his long arms flung across its curved back, one long leg thrown casually over another, their length and strength accentuated by the fashionably close cut of his pantaloons. Jensen’s gaze unbidden and unstoppable fell onto the impressive bulge at the front of his trousers and the memory of their morning activities washed afresh over him. His cheeks flushed, Jensen turned away.

He tensed when Jared began to speak and watched in growing apprehension as Mr and Mrs Padalecki’s expressions of benevolence and good humour turned into two identical frowns of astonished disapproval.

“London?” grunted Mr Padalecki, clearing his throat and putting down his drink, looking askance at his son.

Jared nodded. “Indeed. I have been getting some very pressing letters from my old friends and acquaintances, some of whom I haven’t had the pleasure of seeing since my departure all those years back. I thought now would be an excellent time to go thither for they are all there for the season.”

“Do you think it wise, Jared?” asked Mrs Padalecki carefully with a swift look at her husband.

“Wise?” asked Jared, raising an eyebrow. “What do you mean? Ah! I think I know.” His lips twitched. “Mother, I am not a wide-eyed youth who is about to get his first taste of metropolis with all its diversions and temptations. I’m sure I shall fare well under their onslaught. Besides, I am not going on my own. Jensen will be there with me. He will make sure that I do not stray from the path of goodness. Isn’t that right?”

He turned in Jensen’s direction and gave him a wink. Jensen self-consciously lowered his eyes and stared at his lap.

“Jensen is to come with you?” asked Mrs Padalecki in surprise.

“But of course! In this way we also get to pick his new clothes without going into the trouble of delivering them here.”

Jensen’s eyes widened in trepidation and he hastened to add, “Unless you do not wish me to go, ma’am,” he said obediently. “I shall accept whatever decision you make on my account.”

“But why wouldn’t you wish him to go?” interjected Jared. “He has never been to London before, has he?”

“Precisely for that reason, Jared,” growled his father. “You are not a wide-eyed youth to get your first taste of metropolis – but Jensen certainly is! Everyone knows that London corrupts even the most innocent.”

Jensen blushed; if only they knew how far from innocent he was!

“Who will keep him on the path of goodness then?” Mr Padalecki retrieved his snuff-box with a disgruntled shake of his head.

“Do you mean to tell me, sir, that I am incapable of taking care of someone put in my charge?” asked Jared. “Do you mean to imply that I will let him come to harm under my care?”

“Jared!” cried Mrs Padalecki. “I am sure your father means nothing of the sort! You are not, are you, Gerald?”

Mr Padalecki grunted something under his breath. Jensen left his seat in agitation and moved to the window, turning his back on the argument. He was ashamed with himself. It had been his duty to check Jared’s levity, recklessness and imprudence. And what had he done instead? Condoned it? Encouraged it? Participated in it? He had completely forgotten himself, his moral lessons, his good intentions, his filial duties, his many obligations. He had let his guardians down. They had counted on him and he succumbed to temptation instead!

Jensen viciously bit into his lower lip, trembling with the effort of keeping the avalanche of remorse and regret that had come over him from spilling forth.

“Jensen is not the kind of young man to find the capital enjoyable,” said Mrs Padalecki softly.

Jared snorted.

“But how is he to know that if he has never been there?” he demanded. “Upon my word, I do not understand you at all!” Jensen heard rather than saw as Jared began to pace the room, acutely aware of his every move. “You didn’t want him to become a clergyman and shut himself up in the country because you thought that it would be tantamount to throwing his life away. You told me yourselves that you wanted him to enjoy life! To take part in its many diversions! Yet now that I offer a short stay in London to do just that, what do you do but oppose my plan? So what am I to understand by this? That you do not trust me? That you do not wish him to go on my account? Well, I say, that’s awfully shabby of you!”

Jensen cringed when Jared plopped back onto the sofa with a thud; it was instantly followed by a weary groan of a piece of furniture ill-used. No one spoke. Jensen stood trembling by the window.

“Jensen, dear, what do you think of Jared’s scheme?” asked Mrs Padalecki gently after a short pause. “Do you wish to go?”

“I wish nothing better than to please you, ma’am,” he replied quietly. “I shall readily submit to whatever decision you make,” he said again.

“Jensen – that is not what I meant. Come here, child. Let me have a look at you.”

Jensen obeyed and upon approaching her armchair dropped to his knees as though a felled tree under the burden of his guilt.

Mrs Padalecki took his face in her hands and pressed tender motherly kisses to his forehead and to his cheeks. “Tell me, dear, do you wish to go?”

Jensen swallowed and nodded. “I... I wish to go with Jared, ma’am. I... think it would be a valuable experience. I’ve already done so many things I never thought I would.” He willed himself not to blush at such a double-meaning admission. “I believe I would like to spend some time in town. To see how different it is from the country. However, I will feel at ease about going only if you fully approve of the scheme. I do not wish to go if it means that my going will cause you any distress.”

Mrs Padalecki looked at him with tearful eyes, gently caressing his cheek. “My dear, you so rarely ask for anything, I simply cannot deny your request. Of course you should go to town. After all, it is what all young men do. Jared will look after you. However, you have never expressed a wish to leave the neighbourhood before and I’m afraid I have grown quite used to the idea that you will always be here – with us.” Her smile was slightly tremulous when she patted him on the cheek and then addressed her husband. “Gerald, how truly silly we are in our desire to protect Jensen from the rest of the world! But can you blame us, dear? You are so young and sheltered and so pretty... There are so many people who would take advantage of that.”

“Dear Lord, mother! He is not a lost puppy!” cried Jared. “No one shall take advantage of him. I can vouch for that. I will make sure that everyone knows that he is under my protection and that they will answer to me if they so much as think of harming him.”

Jensen shook his head and stood up. “I am grateful for all your care and concern, I am sure. However, Jared is right. I am not a lost puppy. I might not have lived much in society or interacted a great deal with people but I have been a keen observer all my life. I have seen good and evil and I am convinced that I will be able to tell which is which. Jared, I do appreciate your intentions and I am ready to accept your protection, but that is where I wish to draw the line. I do not need you to fight my battles for me. After all, how am I to become a man worthy of my name if I am to be treated like a child?”

Mr and Mrs Padalecki appeared to be struck dumb by his words. Jared, on the other hand, began to laugh and clap loudly.

“Bravo, Jensen! Bravo!” he cried. “I dare say that little speech of yours should be proof enough to my parents that you are capable of taking care of yourself.”

“Well, well!” gurgled Mr Padalecki shamefacedly, tucking his snuff-box out of sight. “No one said... just a precaution... upon my word!”

Mrs Padalecki sniffed and began to press a handkerchief to the corners of her eyes.

“Mother, what is it? Why do you cry?” asked Jared jovially. “Personally, I see no occasion for that!”

Mrs Padalecki shook her head.

“I’m afraid I have only now realized that Jensen is no longer my little darling boy. He has grown up without our noticing and has become a fine young man.”

“Indeed!”

Jared chortled in perfect imitation of his father while smirking at Jensen. Jensen looked away, pleased and embarrassed at the same time. He was thankful when Jared didn’t pursue a conversation with him just then, overwhelmed and oppressed as his mind was at that moment, he would have found it extremely difficult to be an active participant.

Jared addressed Mr Padalecki with the following olive branch instead –

“My dear sir, you have been the most indulgent, kind, understanding, tender and lenient of fathers any son can only hope to be blessed with. God knows I have not been the kind of son you and mother wanted me to be or, frankly speaking, the son that you deserve. I know well that I am yet to prove my worth to you. Therefore, I want you to know that upon my return from London I will take my responsibilities as your heir and my obligations as a landowner and the future master of the estate without any more delays or excuses.”

Mr Padalecki looked startled but gratified by such a solemn address. He cleared his throat and gave Jared a benign smile. “Well, well! I must say I am pleased to hear you speak so prudently on the matter, son. I must confess I was mightily concerned as I watched how you chose to employ your time back home.”

“Doesn’t spare a single thought to his future,” interposed his wife with a fond shake of her head, repeating her husband’s words. “Cares not for the land! Won’t take a wife! Has no heir! Who’s to inherit the estate when we’re all gone?”

“Aye, dear! I see now that I was wrong,” chuckled Mr Padalecki self-deprecatingly, waving at his lady. “I am glad. I am glad.”

“Capital!” roared Jared and clapped himself on the knee.

For some time everyone was too content to notice an expression of profound mental perturbation that had appeared upon Jensen’s face. However, nothing could escape Mrs Padalecki’s sharp eye for long.

“Jensen, what is it?” she asked when she happened to look about herself. “Are you having second thoughts about going now that you have our blessing? Do not worry, dear, we can always take it back.”

Jensen shook his head.

“What is it then?”

“I’m afraid I’m having thoughts about something I’m not sure I should even contemplate,” he told her gravely. “I do know, however, that I need your advice for I cannot trust my own judgment in the matter. It is a matter of personal and extremely delicate nature and it has occurred to me only now that I should be going to London.”

“What is it, son?” asked Mr Padalecki with a worried look at his wife who had gone rather pale.

Jensen took a deep breath and looked at Mrs Padalecki.

“Do you think… do you think it would be wise on my part to look for my mother while I’m there?”

“Your mother!” exclaimed the latter, looking almost terrified at the thought.

Jensen nodded and watched as the other three exchanged troubled looks.

“I remember someone telling me that she went to the capital after… after,” he went on, frowning as Mrs Padalecki continued to shift her alarmed gaze from her husband to her son. “I mean to say… I do not even know whether she is still alive. I do not think that she ever tried to contact me, but I thought I could ask around. I’m sure I could find my father’s old acquaintances… Maybe they know something about her fate...”

Mr Padalecki took out his snuff-box again. Mrs Padalecki worried her lower lip. Jared, in the meantime, watched him with a narrow-eyed expression.

“I thought you didn’t want to know her,” said Mrs Padalecki at length. “In fact, you have been quite adamant that you did not wish to hear or speak of her.”

“I… believe I’ve started looking differently at certain things lately. I wish to reconcile with her.”

“I have some useful contacts in town,” said Jared. “I could ask for their help in locating her.”

Jensen looked gratefully at him but was startled before he could give him a proper smile by a shocked gasp that had escaped Mrs Padalecki’s lips. He looked at her in confusion.

Jared raised an eyebrow and stared dispassionately at her. “I can assure you, ma’am, my men will be discreet. No one will know anything of the past scandal or anyone involved in it.”

“Well, well!” rumbled Mr Padalecki. “In this case! Why not?”

For the second time that evening Jensen felt obliged to leave his seat and take a turn about the room before stationing himself in front of the window in order to compose himself and make sure that his countenance did not reflect the tumult of his thoughts and confusion of his sensations. He started violently when he felt Jared’s overpowering presence behind him; too close, too intimate to be considered proper.

“Relax,” whispered Jared into his ear, his voice a rumble of amusement. “My parents are busy at the card table. I suggested that they should play something that requires only two players tonight. They agreed.”

Jensen didn’t relax for the very next moment Jared began to run the tips of his fingers up and down his arms, making him shiver.

“Jared, don’t…” he gasped, lowering his head towards his chest and unwittingly exposing the back of his neck for Jared to place a soft kiss there.

Jensen shuddered. “Jared, you will be the ruin of me.”

Jared chuckled, still standing dangerously close to him. “For a moment there I thought that our plan to go to London together was doomed to failure. I thought I would have to use all of my eloquence to convince them of my honourable intentions towards you.”

His statement elicited a snort from Jensen. “We both know that there is nothing honourable about your intentions towards me.”

“I am offended to hear you speak thus!”

“Why, Jared, are you not taking me to London to debauch?”

“Jensen, sweetheart, you give me palpitations when you use such naughty language. However, as I was saying, I was certain that we would not succeed in convincing them to let you go.” He snorted softly. “Of course, I hadn’t counted on the extraordinary power of penitence and submission and the masterful manner in which you delivered them. Upon my word, you were irresistible kneeling down, your posture a perfect picture of humility and surrender, your eyes brimming with tears of supplication. My parents had lost that battle long before they knew it. I wager there is nothing they wouldn’t do for you if you asked them prettily enough. Hence, I tried to emulate your example next and presented my parents with my own contrition and who would have thought but that it does work wonders!”

Jensen frowned at the implication he thought he had detected in Jared’s words.

“I was ready to give up the scheme, Jared. I used no arts but the truth.”

Jared shook his head, his forehead brushing against the back of Jensen’s head.

“So pure.”

“How can you say that?” bristled Jensen at once. “How can you call me pure after what we’ve done?”

“Do you think that the natural reaction of your body to outward stimulation has somehow tainted the purity of your soul?” asked Jared.

“I do not know that I have ever been truly pure in the first place,” replied Jensen. “I could not resist the temptation. I fell prey to lust. I was too weak, too eager, too ready to partake of it with you. In fact, I continue to seek and pursue it by following you to metropolis, fully aware of wrongness and unnaturalness of the acts that we commit together.”

“Jensen, it is only natural to feel all these things,” said Jared in exasperation.

Jensen shook his head. “ _We must not ascribe to nature what ought to be ascribed to our own perverseness_ ,” he quoted.

“I cannot agree with you there. You are young and passionate and your body seeks pleasure and relief and acts accordingly when in contact with another body. I would think that something was very wrong with you if you failed to get excited under the circumstances. You have had the taste of pleasures of the flesh and you want more. It is all too natural and it doesn’t diminish the purity of your soul or the tenderness of your heart.”

“It is hardly natural that I should wish to experience all that with another man, though. Do not tell me that it is not so. Do not convince me otherwise. It is forbidden by everything that is moral and right and it should stop me but it doesn’t. It doesn’t. Jared, what is wrong with me? Why is it that the thought of your going away without me frightens me more than committing so unnatural a sin?”

Jensen began to tremble but Jared’s warm hand on the back of his neck had a calming effect.

“Hush now, love; you have grown too agitated,” he murmured. “How about I bring you a glass of wine? It will calm you down in a jiffy and then we will have a quiet game of backgammon like a veritable pair of old coots.”

Jensen snorted and shook his head; what a strange notion that a glass of wine and a game of backgammon could calm him down!

Surprisingly enough, they did. However, upon reflection, Jensen decided that the biggest share of success had to be attributed to Jared’s warm presence and support.


	12. Chapter 12

The carriage was announced. Mrs Padalecki began to weep and dab at tears welling in her eyes as she followed Jensen and Jared through the entrance hall and onto the porch, leaning heavily on Mr Padalecki’s arm.

“There, there, my dear,” said the latter, gently patting her hand. “Let us not bewail their journey and bedew the road ahead of them with tears lest it brings about trouble.”

“Father is right,” said Jared jovially. “Though, to be sure, I never travel without a pistol on such occasions.” He patted the side of his greatcoat and smirked.

“Oh, Jared, do be careful!” cried Mrs Padalecki, throwing herself onto his chest. “You can be so fearfully reckless sometimes and you know how I detest pistols. Ever since – ”

The horses neighed impatiently, interrupting Mrs Padalecki. She stopped with a shuddering breath; Jared patted her awkwardly on the back.

“Oh, but do not spend all your time in London at those loathsome clubs of yours,” she went on after having somewhat composed herself. “You must show Jensen around. Take him to Hyde Park and Drury Lane and Astley’s and Exeter Exchange and Almack’s. Good Heaven! Do you think you might be able to procure a voucher this late into the season? But Jensen absolutely must visit some of those places at least. It would be such a shame if he doesn’t.”

“Well!” exclaimed Jared. “I must confess that I am not too fond of all these public places no more than I am fond of Brooks’s or White’s, you know, but I do mean to take him to Bond Street, Tattersall’s and Gentleman Jackson’s saloon the first chance I’ve got.”

“Phoo, phoo! Shopping, horses and boxing! Upon my word, Jared, is this your idea of metropolitan diversions? I’m sure Jensen does not care for them nor does he go to town to see them. He is not such a coxcomb or a sportsman as you are. You have to consider and consult his interests, passions, peculiarity of his disposition and preferences as well as your own, you know.”

Mrs Padalecki shook her head. Jared laughed, hugged her to his chest and planted a rough kiss onto her cheek in a whirlwind of movements that rendered her vision blurry.

 _“Adieu, maman!”_ he cried. “Do not fret so. I will take good care of Jensen. Trust me on that!”

He waved his hat to his father, who returned his merry farewell with a solemn nod, and jumped into the carriage with a wide grin on his handsome face, as carefree as a giddy youth about to embark upon Great Tour of Europe.

Mrs Padalecki turned to Jensen next. She took his face in her trembling hands and kissed him softly on both cheeks.

“Do take care of yourself, dear,” she said with a sniff. “And make sure that Jared doesn’t get himself into any trouble.”

Jensen nodded. “I will, ma’am. Do not make yourself uneasy.” On impulse, quite overcome by emotions, he did something that he had never done before and kissed her on both cheeks, imitating her earlier actions. Mrs Padalecki looked immensely surprised but greatly pleased. “Thank you for granting my request and allowing me to accompany Jared,” he said in a choked voice. “I am looking forward to my stay in town.”

“Well, get into the damn carriage then!” bellowed Jared from within. “The horses are getting quite impatient and unless you want me to use that pistol, mother, you’d better let Jensen go now or else we’ll be stuck driving at night.”

Mrs Padalecki started and nodded, her face pale and terrified. Jensen shook Mr Padalecki’s hand.

“Have a good time, my boy,” said his guardian as he clapped him on the back.

Jensen gave one final nod and entered the carriage.

“Have a safe trip!” cried Mrs Padalecki, waving her handkerchief. “Do not forget to write and do send a short note at least upon your arrival!”

That was the last thing that Jensen heard before Jared knocked on the roof of the carriage with the handle of his walking stick and they were off with an almighty jolt. For a few minutes no one spoke. Then, Jared chuckled.

“Poor mother worrying that you should not see London’s main attractions. Ha! I wonder what she would say if she knew that I have no intention of letting you leave my bed at all.”

“Jared,” hissed Jensen, glaring at him.

“What?” Jared chuckled. “I thought you knew what you were getting yourself into. My dishonourable intentions and all that…”

“But do you want the coachman and the groom to know that too? Do you want them to know how perverted you are? Do you want to end up at Newgate Prison?”

“Relax,” Jared chuckled and threw his arm around Jensen’s stiff shoulders, practically tucking him into his side, aided and abetted in doing so by the swaying of the carriage.

“I hope you do not mean it,” said Jensen quietly. “I do want to see London.”

Jensen could tell that Jared had smiled at his words by an audible puff of air that had accompanied it. He felt warm and pleased when Jared’s lips touched his temple.

“Of course you do,” he murmured. “I would be much surprised if you didn’t. I will take you wherever you want to go and show you whatever you want to see.”

Jensen smiled.

“I know that we haven’t really discussed any of it,” said Jared with a wave of his hand to indicate the two of them once Jensen relaxed into his embrace. “I am well aware that you have doubts and concerns; that you are ridden by guilt and remorse; that you are confused and petrified; that you experience emotions that tear you apart and sensations that you do not know how to deal with; your feelings are extreme and acute for they bespeak your first romantic attachment.”

Jensen blushed and squirmed against him. However, he wasn’t surprised that Jared knew of the true nature of his feelings towards him – after all, he had all but confessed them to him!

“I see how your better feelings, those of evangelic piety and righteousness, that you have been cultivating all your life, revolt against the very thought – as they rightly should.”

Jensen frowned, startled.

“However,” continued Jared, “your youth, your eagerness, your inquisitiveness, your _joie de vivre_ , that had sprung free of restraints and shackles you had kept it locked in, thirsty and greedy to be sated, and that something that we all possess and that nine times out of ten lead us to our ruin, crave it so much that you have come to accept it, blaming it on your own perverseness.”

Jensen looked at him. Jared shook his head.

“No, Jensen. I cannot deny that I am the one to blame for that nor am I going to. I have enough honour within me to own to that at least. I once told you that I am a selfish man and that I take pleasure whenever an opportunity presents itself. I saw you and I was tempted and instead of checking my wickedness, instead of sparing you from my pernicious touch, I began my pursuit. And you – the possessor of nature so tender, so eager to please, so anxious to submit – you gave yourself over to me.”

“Jared – what are you saying?” Jensen’s voice trembled.

“I’m saying that I’m a blackguard who corrupted you.”

Jensen shook his head. “That’s not true.”

“Oh, but it is! And there’s more! I do not repent it in the least. I do not, do you see? I saw your potential and I took it upon myself to release it from its suffocating bonds.”

“You are making no sense, Jared. I do not understand you at all. What potential are you talking of?”

“Why! I am talking of your potential for passion, pleasure, tenderness, love! I could not watch them being suppressed and subdued by your pursuit of such utter purity that can only be attained through relentless mortification of every thought and feeling responsible for making your body a perfect vessel of human lust. In a manner of speaking, Jensen, you are my creation. I am molding you into a perfect companion I have been seeking all my life. I grant you I had lovers and mistresses aplenty and yet none of them made me feel the way you make me feel.” Jared chuckled. “A little bit of _quid pro quo_ for you here, sweetheart. After all, your little confession was the sweetest of nectars that had ever touched my soul.”

“Jared, I’m not sure I understand what – ”

“I will make it simple then,” interrupted Jared softly but firmly, making Jensen shiver. “My intentions while dishonorable in that I intend to bed you and make you my lover instead of marrying you are very serious indeed. I do not intend to let you go once you are mine. I thought you should know.”

The force of Jared’s embrace increased perceptibly at that and Jensen’s heart began to hammer in his chest. However, he could not quite understand why Jared was telling him about his feelings and intentions now that they were driving towards their destination anyway. Did he think that his words would make Jensen jump out of the carriage in horror? Or did he think that being entrapped within, swiftly borne by four-in-hand, would prevent him from escaping?

Jensen pursed his lips. He had made up his mind about being with Jared long before Jared conceived taking him to town in order to bed him and make him his lover and keep him indefinitely as such. He could hardly marry him! Jensen had come to accept some time before that his childish beliefs and aspirations, indulged and urged by him for years out of folly and naïveté, were just that.

It hadn’t taken him long to discover that he preferred frolicking about the country with Jared to composing sermons. Naturally, he was shocked and appalled and disgusted and mortified that he should have been so vicious as to develop a romantic attachment to another man and then to proceed to share in carnal pleasures with him. But then again, looking back, he had to admit that no woman, however pretty or flirtatious, had ever succeeded in making him fall in passion with her.

He had previously attributed this particular circumstance to the fortitude of his character and the purity of his spirit. However, he wondered now whether he had always been so unnaturally inclined towards his own sex. His determination to continue an intimate relationship with Jared terrified him to a degree so high it was beyond his commonsense to comprehend and his resolution to become the man’s lover even more so. He never knew himself until he met Jared; until he discovered that his temper was reckless and impetuous and that he was capable of conducting a clandestine affair of so awful a nature that had it become public knowledge his reputation and his very live would be at stake.

He thought of his beloved guardians and what they would say if they knew of how ungrateful and depraved he was and his eyes burnt with shame and filled with tears of humiliation and repentance for letting them down. They certainly did not deserve to be betrayed in such a horrific manner by the one they took in, loved as their own, cherished, trusted and believed that he could do no wrong. And though he told himself that in this way, at least, he would not be breaking his promise of keeping Jared out of trouble, for bound to Jensen he would not seek it abroad, he wasn’t so delusional as to believe that it justified his own actions.

He was startled by a soft touch to his cheek. “What have you been thinking so intently of, love?” murmured Jared into his ear. “Do not tell me that you are already planning your escape. I’m no Bluebeard. I will not keep you locked up in my bedchamber against your will.”

Jensen snorted. “You are an idiot, Jared. I thought you should know that. I would not have entered this carriage or this arrangement had I not known what it meant or entailed.”

“Oh, but do you?” purred Jared, insinuating his hand between the opening in Jensen’s greatcoat and placing it over his crotch. “Do you truly know what it means and entails?”

He pressed down with his palm.

“I… I believe I do,” stuttered Jensen as a sudden wave of heat rushed through his body, making him dizzy and hard at the same time.

Jared hummed. “I am looking forward to expanding your education and knowledge in this respect. I know that you are terrified by the mere prospect of what I have in store for you but I admire your bravado. However,” he added and his voice had become stern and solemn, “I can assure you that I will never make you do anything against your will or force you to do something you are not ready for.”

Jensen nodded, growing full and heavy in the confines of his breeches. His gloved hands gripped the settee on either side of him.

“I know for a fact that you enjoy when I do this,” whispered Jared, his hand precise and relentless. Jensen was breathing loudly and rapidly through his nose now, his back arching slightly and his hips undulating with the movement of that wicked hand. “However, I am pretty sure that you would not wish me to bring you to release while we are rattling in the carriage,” he added softly. “Therefore, I shall withdraw my hand now and leave you with a promise of what is… to come…”

He did just that, leaving Jensen in agony of inflamed but unfulfilled desire, gritting his teeth, willing his arousal to abate and calling Jared some rather unflattering names under his breath.

*

They arrived late in the afternoon to a modern-looking house on a smaller scale in a fashionable part of town that Jared had hired for their sojourn there. Jensen was stiff and sleepy and prone to grumble over the fact that blessed slumber he had eventually succumbed to had been so untimely interrupted.

However, he became immediately awake when they found themselves alone in the drawing-room and Jared pounced on him, bringing their bodies together. Jared grabbed Jensen’s face with a growl and leaned down in order to plunder his lips when Jensen swiftly turned away, planting a kiss to the palm of Jared’s hand instead.

“Jensen, there is no reason for that now,” cajoled Jared, holding his face and looking earnestly into his eyes. “No one will breathe a word of it to my parents or anyone else for that matter. I can assure you that nothing that happens in this house will ever leave its walls. I made sure of that.”

Jensen nodded. “I would think that you would have more pressing matters to deal with upon our arrival other than – this. Don’t you have to write to your parents and make certain inquires?”

“I’m sure it can wait.”

“I’m sure it can’t.”

“Jensen – ”

“Jared.”

Jared frowned.

“What is going on? Why won’t you let me kiss you?”

Jensen took a deep breath.

“You promised to help me find my mother,” he said.

“I remember.”

“You can kiss me then.”

“Why will you deny me now?”

“Do you have to ask?”

“I’m afraid I do. I do not understand.”

Jensen swallowed hard.

“Jared,” he said softly, putting his hands gently on the older man’s chest and looking him straight in the eye, flinching slightly at their stormy aspect. “In this arrangement you have all the power, all the knowledge, all the experience – you have an excellent hand and you know how to play it to your advantage. I need something up my sleeve as well. Some sort of leverage, if you will. Let me have this at least. Please?”

A short pause ensued. Finally, Jared touched Jensen’s lips with his fingers before giving him a wry smile. “You say that I have all the power in this arrangement and yet one soft look from you flung from under your ridiculously long eyelashes, one gentle touch of your hand, a few pretty pleas, slipping from your lips on a sigh I wish to devour, and I crumble at your feet – powerless.”

Jared ran his fingers along the side of Jensen’s face.

“Not so artless after all, are you?”

Jensen smiled. “I am a quick study and you are an excellent teacher. You taught me quite a lesson back there in the carriage…”

Jared shook his head, looking impressed. Jensen smirked, stood on his toes and kissed Jared on the cheek.

“I shall withdraw my lips now,” he said in perfect imitation of Jared’s earlier words, “and leave you with a promise of what is… to come…”

Jared threw back his head and laughed. Jensen bowed and sauntered away, smiling to himself.


	13. Chapter 13

Jensen was leaning over the washstand, wearing nothing but a loose nightshirt, when the door to his room opened and closed. He instantly noted the way his heart began to beat faster in his chest and the way his hands began to tremble upon Jared’s approach. He knew what was to come now that they were alone in the house, barring a few trusted servants who knew better than to roam the place at night.

He had been mentally preparing himself for it ever since he agreed to accompany Jared to London. However, he could not stop the fear of the unknown twisting his innards and turning them into wriggling worms, while the wrongness of the act that they were about to commit was as forcefully as ever impressed upon his troubled mind. He gasped loudly and started rather violently when Jared gripped his hips and pressed his face into the crook of his neck.

“Jensen, you must loosen up,” he murmured with a sigh. “I am not going to harm you in any way and it will bring none of us any pleasure or gratification if you are as stiff as a corpse. I may be depraved inasmuch as I prefer to bed men but I have never been fond of necrophilia.”

Jensen took a deep breath and nodded, willing himself to relax when Jared’s hands began to slide up and down his sides, bunching up his nightshirt and leaving a trail of goose-bumps in their wake.

“Forgive me, Jared. I will attempt to do better.”

“Attempt to do better?! Jensen, this is not an examination!” exclaimed Jared in exasperation. “I do not require you to do better – I need you to feel at ease and enjoy yourself!”

Jensen sighed and hung his head in shame. “I know this is not what you had in mind when – I will completely understand if you – I mean – ”

With a roar that made Jensen jump Jared whirled him around to face him.

“What precisely do you think is going on here, Jensen?” he demanded furiously.

Jensen looked at him half-confused, half-terrified.

“Do you think this is some sort of equivalent of a wedding night? Do you think that I expect you to spread your legs, stare at the ceiling and do your duty like a good little wife, whether you want to or not?”

Jensen shook his head.

“Exactly! I do not need a puppet who will move as long as I pull the strings. I haven’t brought you here to satisfy my urges on my command. You are not my body slave. There are places in town where I could procure whatever I wanted if all I wanted was the gratification of the flesh.” Jared pushed his hand through his hair. “I’m afraid my earlier confession failed to make a duly impression on you if you feel that it is your obligation to give me that which I want as meekly as a lamb. I want you to be my companion, Jensen. My equal. I want you to receive and to provide pleasure on equal grounds. I want you to tell me what you want from me. I want you to take it!”

Jensen was trembling and shaking his head in desperation now.

“I cannot do that, Jared. I cannot be what you want me to be. I do not know how.”

“Then I will teach you!” exclaimed Jared. He shook his head in frustration and heaved a profound sigh before taking Jensen’s hand in his and tugging him along. “Come with me,” he said softly. “I will show you.”

Jared led Jensen towards the bed and silently motioned for him to lie down on top of the covers, following his suit the next moment and arranging them both so that they were facing one another with barely a distance between them.

Jared was wearing his dressing gown and as its embroidered lapels parted at the motion, Jensen’s eyes fell upon the other man’s chest, revealed in the process, covered with an array of dark curly hairs. He could not look away; mesmerized and terrified by the realization that Jared was completely naked underneath.

“Do you enjoy when I touch you?” asked Jared in a low voice, placing his palm on Jensen’s thigh.

Jensen’s eyes instantly snapped upwards to meet his. Jared waited; his hand moving slowly up and down, feathery light, as though encouraging Jensen to speak. At last, Jensen nodded, his mouth filling with saliva at the teasing touch.

Jared hummed.

“I must confess I am rather partial to being touched myself,” he said conversationally. “I trust you are not averse to obliging me in return?”

Jensen stiffened at the question, feeling too timid and fearful lest he should do something wrong to be asked to provide the actual touching. However, he was immediately distracted by Jared’s fingers that began to dance along his thigh.

“Come on, sweetheart,” he coaxed. “I know that there is plenty of temerity beneath all that virginal modesty of yours.”

Jensen flushed with embarrassment. However, after a moment’s hesitation, in part goaded by Jared’s challenging eyebrow and in part spurred by his own confounded curiosity, he placed his own hand on the exposed part of Jared’s chest.

His hand shook. He quickly looked up at Jared to see his reaction. Encouraged by his nod of approval and a wide smile that accompanied it, he proceeded to move it across the broad and solid expanse beneath his palm, letting his fingers timidly wander through the hairs there.

Jared’s hand, in the meantime, travelled downwards, and slipping slightly to the side, settled on Jensen’s inner thigh, the tips of his fingers lightly grazing Jensen’s cock. Jensen gasped as it twitched with interest and brought his legs together, trapping Jared’s hand there.

Jared chuckled.

“I’m afraid I will need to be able to use my hand if you wish me to finish that which I started back in the carriage,” he said.

Jensen let his legs fall apart at once, shocking himself by his own ready wantonness.

“Such a good boy,” murmured Jared appreciatively, making Jensen tremble with pleasure and flush another shade darker.

Jared took hold of Jensen’s nightshirt and pulled it upwards. Jensen shivered when cold air hit his exposed parts but before he could cover himself up Jared took hold of his hardening length, squeezed once, eliciting a loud moan from him, and began to jerk him off. Jensen’s eyes fluttered shut; he pressed his forehead against Jared’s shoulder just as his trembling fingers scrambled for purchase, sinking into the other man’s skin. Jared hissed and brought his other hand to Jensen’s chest. Jensen’s eyes flew open and he let out an embarrassing yelp when Jared’s fingers pinched one of his nipples. Grinning, Jared pinched the other one. Jensen managed not to yelp this time, arching his back like a cat.

He vaguely wondered by means of what unnatural arts Jared managed to maintain such a firm grip on his cock, play with his nipples and talk at the same time, calling him a good boy over and over again and remarking on how sensitive his nipples were. Jensen himself could not concentrate on anything but panting and moaning and occasionally screaming due to overwhelming sensations conjured by Jared’s hand between his legs and that constant rubbing and squeezing and pinching and biting and sucking and lapping and kissing that his nipples were being subjected to.

He could feel the pressure, the inevitable explosion, building up with tidal force within him, blinding and consuming him with need and want.

His cock was on fire, his muscles were trembling and contracting, his legs were flailing, the growing throbbing inside was reverberating as loudly as drum roll in his ears. The tip of his cock was leaking and dribbling all over the place. He wrapped his arms around Jared’s midriff and pressed his face into his sweat-coated side when Jared’s hand – the one that had been playing with his nipples – suddenly changed its assignation and travelled downwards to cup his balls, squishing and kneading them between his assured fingers.

Jensen’s eyes popped out and he keened when one long, slippery finger dipped in between his buttocks and slipped into his quivering hole. His mouth fell open and he began to shake uncontrollably as he came, thrusting and spasming and spraying himself and Jared with his release; Jared’s finger, all the while, perversely pushing inside…

Jensen decided that he must have let go off Jared at some point – perhaps even blacked out for a split second, because when he opened his eyes again Jared was towering over him, his gown discarded, his naked body gleaming in the candle-light like a work of art and his enormous dick grasped in his large, veined hand. Jensen thought that he would have fainted or come again at the sight, had he not been already sprawled on his back, utterly spent, a muffled buzzing filling his ears.

His body was trembling with feeble tremors and his heart was pounding audibly in his chest. His legs and arms were spread out, his nipples felt raw and tender and his nightshirt was still bunched up around him, revealing his languid cock and balls, his thighs sticky with the mess he had made. The memory of Jared’s finger deep inside him made Jensen flush so hard he felt as though he was on fire.

Pounding his cock so fast it was becoming an indistinct blur, Jared reached down between Jensen’s thighs with the other. He wrapped his fingers around Jensen’s cock again, making him hiss and squirm at the sensation, for it was too much to feel his touch – his burning touch – on that extremely sensitive part of his anatomy right now. However, Jared didn’t linger there on present occasion.

His fingers trailed towards Jensen’s balls next. Jensen began to shake his head – he wanted to tell him that it was too soon – when the tickling and the pinching and the scratching began. He was shifting from side to side, closing and opening his thighs, gasping and sniffing and mewling pitifully, pleading with Jared either to stop or to proceed. He could not quite tell which. Yet that was not Jared’s destination either.

Jensen bucked when he felt a slippery finger inching towards his hole again, rubbing along the perineum before wriggling past the tight circle of muscles inside. Jensen’s cock began to stir almost at once and he actually whinnied when that long deft finger curved somewhere inside before pushing deeper yet, reaching something so powerful within him it lifted him off the bed. Jensen clenched his hole around the intruding digit just as Jared came all over him with a roar.

Jared took care not to collapse on top of Jensen then and there but it was with a tremendous effort that he managed to lower himself on his side instead, shaking with the echoes of his own release, and position himself so that they were once again facing one another. Jensen instinctively closed what little distance there was between them by wrapping his arms around Jared and tucking his head into his heaving chest, mindless of their sweaty and sticky bodies. Jared drew Jensen even closer to himself and tightened his arms around him, running his hands up and down his back and peppering the top of his head, forehead and eyelids with tender kisses. They fell asleep in each other’s arms.

*

First thing in the morning Jared ordered a bath to be drawn and as soon as the footman was dismissed indicated that Jensen should join him. Jensen didn’t hesitate and followed him to the adjoining room where, behind a screen in front of the roaring fire, there stood a well-filled tub with a thin film of steam hovering above it; on a stool next to it there was a round piece of soap, strongly smelling of some sweet flower Jensen could not quite identify, a washcloth and a ewer.

Jensen watched in fascination as Jared pulled off his dressing-gown – much as always supremely unconcerned by or unashamed of his nakedness – and climbed into the tub, closing his eyes and sighing in bliss as he found himself under the water. Jensen remained where he was, unsure what he should do next. He looked about himself and as he spotted an armchair with a fresh paper on it, peeking from behind the screen, he wondered whether Jared meant for him to take a seat and to read to him before taking his turn.

“Jensen, may I ask what it is that you are waiting for?” asked Jared a moment later as he reluctantly opened his eyes and gave him a very pointed look. “I dare say there’s enough room for the both of us.”

“The only manner in which there will be enough room for the both of us is if I lie on top of you,” said Jensen, regarding the tub with a frown.

Jared smirked. “Indeed. I believe that is the general idea, my young friend.”

Jensen stared at him.

“For heaven’s sake! I beg you would not revert to that blasted coyness of yours,” said Jared. “I quite detest it.”

“But what do you propose I should do then?” asked Jensen.

“I would think it obvious. I propose that you take off your damn nightshirt – I think I am entitled to see my lover without a wrap – and join me for a morning bath.”

Jensen swallowed. “Join you?”

Jared nodded, looking extremely self-satisfied.

Jensen dropped his gaze to the floor. “Will you look away?” he asked quietly.

Jared chuckled. “Look away? Why should I do that? I intend to see you naked quite a lot. I hope you know that.”

Jensen shuffled from foot to foot.

Jared threw his head back and laughed. “Good Lord, Jensen, don’t be such a bloody prude! I have already seen you naked on numerous occasions and as far as modesty goes I would think you would have none left after those things that we did last night.”

Jensen turned scarlet at the memory and dropped his head to his chest. Jared groaned and closed his eyes. “Fine! Fine! Fine! I’m not looking. But you’d better get undressed and get into that tub before I change my mind – or I will get out and help you in myself.”

Jensen nodded even though Jared could not see him and hurried to comply.

The skin between his thighs felt particularly unpleasant in the light of day but he had no time to dwell on that uncomfortable sensation as he gingerly climbed into the warmth of the tub. The tub turned out to be much bigger than he had imagined, rendering his earlier assumption wrong. He did not have to lie on top of Jared for them both to fit in after all. However, as he had never shared a tub with another man before, he decided that it was a reasonable error of judgment to make.

Having arranged himself within its sufficient depths, Jensen decided that it must have been built specifically to accommodate Jared’s enormous height for it allowed Jensen to occupy its other end without so much as touching Jared. Not to mention that once he was submerged, only his neck, head and the tips of his knees remained visible above the surface, his legs being pressed close to his chest, which meant that his modesty was well preserved.

Despite Jared’s earlier assumption, he had not been stripped of every last bit of it just yet. However, he knew that it was only a matter of time. He was absolutely terrified by the very notion, of course, but there was a part of him that felt rather bold and that wished to do something that would take the older man by surprise.

Jensen was startled out of his thoughts when he found Jared looking at him through heavily-lidded eyes. He blushed and wondered when Jared had opened his eyes again – how much he had seen – and whether he had been so much preoccupied with his own reflections that he had utterly failed to notice it.

“But what is this?” exclaimed Jared. “Why is it that you are so far away?” He shook his head. “That won’t do, Jensen. That won’t do at all.”

He sounded disappointed and displeased. Jensen swallowed and allowed himself to stretch his legs to their full length; being almost as long as Jared’s, they easily tangled with his.

“Better…” Jared smiled and tilted his head to the side. “Still… I wager you can do better yet…”

Jensen narrowed his eyes at the definite challenge in the other man’s voice and catching sight of the soap and the washcloth on the stool nearby instantly made up his mind. Not saying a single word, he took them and dipped them both into the water before slathering the washcloth with the soap. Then, firmly telling himself not to blush at the burning intensity with which Jared was looking at him – it was, in fact, rendering the room much hotter than the fire in the grate did – he got onto his knees and moved towards Jared, who had sat up straighter in the tub, sliding over his long limbs and finally settling in his lap, his breathing intensifying perceptibly when his butt-cheeks pressed down on Jared’s cock that greeted them with a happy jolt before settling comfortably in the cleft between them.

Jensen took a shuddering breath and using one of Jared’s shoulders for leverage began to scrub Jared’s chest that was glistening enticingly with coppery-coloured droplets of water in the firelight, pleased to see its increasing rise and fall. Jensen slowly dragged the washcloth across its wide expanse before moving it along one arm and then the other, his gaze lingering on that single blemish – a small patch of raised skin – a relic of an old scar he vaguely remembered Jared telling him he had got during a hunting accident many years ago. Having thoroughly washed his upper body, though barely daring to breathe or meet Jared’s eye during the process, Jensen began to tremble in earnest when he realized what he had to do next.

However, he was not going to back down now when he was slowly but surely getting the hang of pleasuring the other man, reassuring himself that touching Jared in so intimate a manner would be less intimidating if he did it with something in between them first. He, therefore, rinsed the washcloth again and rubbed some more soap on it before sliding down Jared’s legs, bending his own legs at the knees and proceeding to pay close attention to Jared’s private bits, petrified yet mesmerized by the feel of Jared’s heavy cock in his hands.

His hands were shaking and his heart was pounding in his chest but he took care not to make any sudden or sharp movement and to be as thorough as he could without losing his mind before moving downwards, running the cloth between Jared’s thighs and along his legs.

“Come here,” said Jared hoarsely when Jensen had finished, startling him into dropping the cloth into the tub and looking up. “Come here,” he repeated in the same rough accent, clearing his throat as he did so, as though he could not quite get the words out without scratching his throat.

Jensen crawled towards him and yelped in surprise when he found himself enveloped within Jared’s embrace, pressed tightly against his slippery body, sloshing water out of the tub as he scrambled to wrap his legs around Jared’s back, their cocks grinding against each other.

Jared began to kiss and nip and bite his neck and shoulders and chest in a frenzied manner, his fingers scratching Jensen’s back and gripping his hips and grabbing his buttocks and spreading them apart as more and more water sloshed onto the floor.

Jensen wrapped his hands around Jared’s head and tugged his fingers through his long messy hair, and when he had the chance to put some distance between them, he took the ewer and, filling it with water from the tub, poured it on top of Jared’s head.

Then, while Jared was nibbling and sucking on his neck and collarbone as though his life depended on it, Jensen lathered his hair with soap and then reduced him to a moaning and gibberish mass when he began to massage his skull, giggling unabashedly at the other man’s sighs and pleas, his own inhibitions seemingly all but washed away.

Afterwards, when Jensen had washed the soap out of Jared’s hair, Jared pushed him gently away and directed him towards the other end of the tub; his eyes blown to the size of dinner plates with lust, he growled deep in his throat, “My turn now.”

Jensen nodded and pressed his back against the wall of the tub, bending his legs at the knees in order to provide Jared with extra space to move about. He was grateful that he’d had the foresight to place his arms on either side of the tub when Jared suddenly grasped his ankles. He gasped and coughed and clutched the edges of the tub for support as Jared grinned and began to kiss his kneecaps before sliding his face right between his legs. Jensen’s stomach tightened in anticipation of arousal he knew would inevitably overwhelm him if Jared continued further down, his cock being permanently half-hard as it was.

Jared fished out the washcloth and after rinsing and soaping it proceeded to imitate Jensen, though applying considerably more assured touches, as well as supplying the rubbing with kisses, both gentle and rough, that he planted onto every inch of his skin, making Jensen quiver and squirm and gasp and move back and forth and grit his teeth and squeeze his eyes shut in frustration each time Jared’s hand or finger withdrew after brushing ever so lightly over his nipples or cock or balls or his expectant hole, all the while craving more. By the time Jared had finished tormenting him the water had gone cold. Yet Jensen was convinced that wasn’t why he was shivering.

He felt dazed and wide-eyed and addle-brained (as he always did after his intimate activities with Jared) by the time he was out of the tub, standing as close to the fireplace as he could manage without falling in. Jared very thoroughly and methodically dried him off with woven linen before leaving another series of kisses across his shoulders and sending him to his room to get dressed and meet him for breakfast, reminding him with a wave of his index finger to put on something from his new wardrobe; it had already been waiting for him in his room by the time they arrived in town.


	14. Chapter 14

Having indulged themselves in a late morning and having enjoyed a rather unhurried breakfast, during which Jared made Jensen blush and squirm and grow hard by touching him both under and above the table, they finally left the house much to Jensen’s relief, for he did not think that he could stand any more teasing on Jared’s part. They went on foot to the public stables, where Jared kept his horses while in town, and from thence set off to the park just in time to see and to be seen by many a member of polite society, who usually took their promenade there at this very fashionable hour of the afternoon.

Their appearance in town and during the season too created quite a stir among the ladies, so that soon wide alleys, hidden walks and curved lanes of the park were aflutter with excited whispers and conversations whose main subject was a very tall gentleman of extremely pleasing appearance and impeccable fashion and his younger companion of extraordinary beauty and demure aspect. Jared was greatly amused, Jensen deeply mortified. In fact, the latter, their illicit activities fresh in his mind, got it into his head that anyone could easily detect what they were about just by looking at them and was so overcome by fear at the notion that it made him almost faint.

He gripped the reins of his mare and did not dare lift his eyes should he see proof of his horrendous suppositions staring right at him upon catching anyone’s gaze, thus earning himself the reputation of the most timid young man about town. Jared, though he did not guess at the true reason of Jensen’s peculiar conduct, took pity on him at last and attributing it to his natural abhorrence of being stared at (“Egad! I’d think you’d be used to that by now.”), proposed riding to the club, where he was certain to find his erstwhile companions, having a game or a drink or, most likely, both, snugly ensconced within the club’s dimmed halls, surrounded by walls that bore silent memory of their past mischief.

“I dare say you wouldn’t believe the times we used to have together,” he added with a chuckle. “Good God! Such mischief as we got to in our youth!”

“I readily believe you on that head,” remarked Jensen half-gravely, half-playfully. “I am sure my fancy could never stretch so far as to imagine that.”

“Ha!” guffawed Jared, looking at Jensen with a sudden wicked gleam in his eyes. “I hope I can say that I have been working on stretching your precious fancy quite nicely as recently as this morning,” he said, now casting a lewd glance at his rear.

Jensen would have fallen right off his horse with shock and outrage had Jared not placed his hand on the small of his back to support him at that very moment. However, his blush was spectacular. Jared’s laughter, on the other hand, was indecent and insupportable. Upon recovering himself long enough to speak, Jensen promised him in a fierce whisper that it would never happen again and refused to talk to Jared the rest of the way to the club, silently fuming with indignation and mortification.

But upon being ushered into one of the private parlours, where Jared had been informed he would find such and such, Jensen’s thoughts took on an entirely different turn. He was going to be introduced to Jared’s intimates and it suddenly occurred to him that they would most probably know all about Jared’s particular preferences and therefore would guess right away at the true nature of their relationship. So then how was he supposed to conduct himself in their presence without perishing with shame?

Fortunately for his state of mind, Jared’s friends were too happy to finally see their dear old friend after so many years apart to take much notice of his companion. He was received with raucous exclamations of unbounded excitement by at least half a dozen men, so that for a while everything was a vivid blur of hands being shaken, faces being jokingly slapped, shoulders being clapped and strong manly embraces being exchanged amidst uproarious laughter and deafening greetings that echoed around the room, all bearing Jared’s name.

At length their raptures had subsided into uncontained grins and nods and shakes of their heads (“It’s been too damn long, man! I say, too damn long!”), swiftly followed by firm conviction, shared by all and sundry, that they should toast their reunion with all the whiskey and brandy the cellars of the place could provide them with. And as soon as the bottles and glasses were brought in, they took to drinking with astonishing energy and health, so that when Jared finally introduced Jensen to the room at large, barely anyone could focus their eyes long enough to give him a knowing or even a half-conscious look.

Jensen, who had prudently restricted his drinking to a few tumblers, was thinking that they would have to send for the carriage in order to transport Jared home in his state of extreme inebriation. However, Jared laughed at his suggestion and merely ordered the horses to be sent back to the stables.

“We shall take a walk!” he announced when Jensen looked askance at him. “It’s a fine frosty night and a spot of fresh air will do me good.”

Jensen was actually surprised when that proved to be true for he had never seen anyone capable of drinking so much and recovering so quickly. By the time they had reached home, Jared was only slightly tipsy but absolutely ravenous. The moment they stepped inside, the footman was sent to the kitchen with urgent orders to bring every bit of meat that he could find there.

“The cook will not be pleased if she finds out that someone was in her larder without her permission,” warned Jensen, observing Jared in amusement.

“I will not be pleased if she doesn’t keep a larder well-stocked with meat,” rejoined Jared, moping about and massaging his stomach as though he hadn’t eaten in ages.

“Knowing your appetite?” Jensen chuckled. “I’m sure she does or she wouldn’t have stayed this long in your employ.”

“Well, she’d better or I’ll give her the sack first thing in the morning,” grumbled Jared.

Jensen shook his head as he regarded Jared’s long form, now sluggishly sprawled on the couch, from the armchair by the fire he had taken.

“I think you’re being unnecessary petulant,” he said like a long-suffering parent gently scolding a tantrum-prone child. “Earlier this evening you sent the note announcing that we would be dining at the club. It is only reasonable to suppose that she would have nothing prepared.”

Jared huffed and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring daggers at Jensen, who merely raised an eyebrow at that. Fortunately, the footman returned a short time later with a plate laden with food, instantly restoring Jared’s good humour as well as peace with the cook, the poor woman had no idea had been in danger of being breached in the first place.

At length, having sufficiently filled his stomach and dismissed the servant for the night, Jared gave Jensen a sultry look from across the room.

“Why is it that you are always so far away?” he asked. “Do not tell me that you are still mad at me. I could not bear it if you were.”

Jensen shook his head with an air of affectionate indulgence just as Jared patted the sofa next to him. He got to his feet and moved towards him, wondering how a man ten years his senior could look so much like a defenseless puppy when he needed to. Upon settling himself comfortably against Jared’s side, with the man’s arm wrapped tightly around him, Jensen marvelled at the fact that he should fit so perfectly there.

“Jared?” he said after a few drowsy minutes, feeling sleep creeping over him but being too comfortable where he was to wish to move.

“Hmm?”

“May I ask you a question?”

“Naturally.”

Jensen cleared his throat.

“I hope you will not think of it as idle curiosity on my part but I have always been under the impression that the decision to go abroad belonged to you. However, I could not help noticing today from the manner in which the subject was alluded to by your acquaintances that it was universally considered as nothing less than exile and that you had been practically forced to leave.”

Jared slowly trailed his fingers through Jensen’s short hair before smoothing it forward.

“Let’s just say that my parents and I did not see eye to eye at the time,” he said after a prolonged pause. “My conduct, my connections, my companions did not meet with their approval. In the end they deemed it prudent that I should leave the country before I completely disgraced them by involving our family name in a scandal caused by certain unwise choices that I’d made.”

He fell silent. Jensen frowned.

“What choices?” he asked in a whisper.

Jared shook his head and, placing a soft kiss on top of Jensen’s head, swiftly untangled himself from his embrace and got to his feet, stretching and yawning with apparent affectation.

“Lord! Have you seen the time?” he exclaimed, pointing at the clock on the mantelpiece. “No wonder I’m exhausted. I am not as young as you are, after all.” He smirked. “How about we call it a night?”

Jensen blinked at the sudden change – at the obvious falsehood lurking underneath the exaggerated display of fatigue. But he merely nodded. He felt discomfited and unsure what else he could do.

“I’ll see you in the morning, sweetheart,” said Jared with a smile that seemed forced at the edges as he bent down to kiss Jensen on the forehead.

“Of course.”

Jensen nodded and watched Jared leave the room with a troubled expression upon his face. He did not broach the subject again when they met at breakfast the next day. However, he did watch him closely throughout the meal.

Jared showed no more signs of unease or concealment or strange conduct and it was easy to believe that Jensen had imagined anything suspicious in the first place and that Jared could have indeed been merely tired; perhaps, even suffering from some distemper or disorder, considering how much he had drunk and eaten that day.

Finally, Jensen decided that whatever unwise choices Jared had made as a result of those faraway days of unchecked dissipation in his youth, it could have no bearing whatsoever on the present and it certainly wasn’t any of Jensen’s business.

Jared was a grown man whose past just like past of other men of comfortable means and liberal manners was naturally blighted by indiscretions committed in their younger days. Jensen soon found confirmation of that conviction in his observation of Jared’s companions. They all fit the description perfectly: belonging to the same circle, wealthy and indolent, they had too much money and leisure on their hands, and having no active profession to keep them occupied and placing their obligations before fashion rather higher than those before their own principles and morals, spent much of their time and fortune in idle pursuits, making books and playing cards and drinking to excess or else conducting illicit affairs, of which they often talked without reserve or discretion in the privacy of their own company.

*

Jensen’s relationship with Jared at that period of time proceeded in the same happy manner of honeymoon bliss. They fell asleep and woke up in each other’s arms, taking time to indulge their lustful desires before and after and, on occasions, in between. Jensen had grown sufficiently bold to initiate some of their intimacies too, knowing that it pleased Jared greatly when he did so. However, there were certain things that he could not bring himself to do and he was grateful that Jared didn’t pressure him into performing them.

For instance, with one such activity Jared astonished Jensen on the morning of their rather cold parting (inasmuch as it didn’t involve falling asleep in the same bed) by unbuttoning his breeches and putting his mouth on his cock, using his tongue to lick and suck on it until Jensen, lost to the world, came down his throat. Jensen knew that he was not ready to return the favour (the very thought of it was enough to make him choke on his own shame) and was thankful that Jared seemed sufficiently pleased with what he could do.

They had been staying in London for a fortnight when the urgency to write a detailed letter to his guardians forced Jensen to stay behind while Jared went to help one of his friends to choose a curricle and a pair of horses. Jensen was just finishing the letter when the footman announced that there was a lady at the door who insisted rather vociferously on being admitted. Jensen bid him to invite her in, thinking that she could be one of those wretches going from house to house either selling something or begging for money and he never turned such people away.

“Miss Genevieve Cortese,” announced the footman, ushering her in.

Jensen bowed at the same time as the lady curtsied, now clean puzzled out of his wits, for her appearance instantly suggested that his original assumption had been utterly wrong. He surreptitiously studied her while she looked about herself with a bold air of someone considering the house for purchase. Her eyes were dark and shrewd, her eyebrows thick and her mouth wide; her skin was rather brown as though she had been much in the sun without a parasol and her hair was dark and glossy, done in a peculiar style that he had never seen on an Englishwoman before. Her frame was thin and her bosom seemed to be made more pronounced by the cut of her gown rather than nature.

“I’m afraid I do not have the pleasure of knowing you, ma’am,” he said politely when she returned her narrow-eyed gaze back to him. “However, you can tell me your business and I shall try to assist in any way I can.”

“My business is with Jared,” she said in a thick and rather sibilant Italian accent. “I need no assistance of yours. Where is he?”

Jensen blinked in astonishment at the rude rejoinder and the fact that she used Jared’s name in such a familiar fashion. “I’m afraid he is not at home at the moment,” he said haltingly, still recovering from the shock. “However, if you leave a – ”

Miss Cortese let out a loud cackle. “Leave! I am not leaving! I have just arrived and I mean to stay.”

Tossing her head, she turned to the footman, leaving Jensen gaping at her.

“My maid is waiting in the carriage with my bags. I can stay in the guest room for now. Well? What are you waiting for? Go and get my things!”

For the first time since his sojourn in town began Jensen questioned his position in Jared’s house. However, it was a relief when the footman looked at him for instructions. Jensen had no choice but to nod.

“Excellent!” exclaimed the stranger, moving towards the door without giving Jensen another look. “I want a bath drawn this instant,” she ordered as she followed the footman out. “Do make sure it is hot. English roads are so dusty.”

Jensen frowned and scrunched his nose in distaste. He did not want her to use that particular bath tub – not after it had witnessed so many intimate moments between him and Jared.

Jared…

Jensen shook his head, closed his eyes and rubbed his face with his hands, suddenly feeling bone-weary and miserable. He wished more than anything that the other man was here to tell him what was going on and who was this woman who seemed to regard Jared’s house as her own. Unbidden, a sickening suspicion entered his head, taking root there.

He was sitting in a kind of stupor when Jared arrived, grinning and telling him enthusiastically all about the curricle and the horses that they had finally settled upon and that his friend meant to race his other friend (Jensen let their names slip right out of his mind) at dawn on the morrow and that the bet was put down in the club’s book and that he could not wait to see who won, because he had placed quite a sum on such and such.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asked in concern when he finally had a good look at Jensen’s drawn face. “Has something happened? Jensen, what is it?”

Jensen cleared his throat. “There is a lady to see you.” He did not meet Jared’s eye. “Miss Cortese.”

Jared swore loudly.

“She has taken the guest room,” continued Jensen in a hollow voice. “It is my understanding that she means to stay.”

“Stay? Not if I have anything to say about it!” roared Jared and stomped off.

Jensen stayed behind, thinking hard. He had hoped – rather naively – that Jared would say that he knew nobody by that name and that some mischief must have taken place. However, he knew now without a shadow of a doubt who that woman in the guest room was and the fact that he was suddenly sharing a house with Jared’s former mistress twisted his gut most painfully.

Having a notion that Jared would return to the drawing-room upon greeting his uninvited guest, Jensen leapt to his feet and hurried to his own room. He had no wish to talk. He knew that men took mistresses all the time and even brought them to their house but it went against everything that he believed in. Perhaps, a wife would have no other choice but to put up with a mistress her husband had taken. But he certainly wasn’t Jared’s wife or his plaything and he didn’t have to put up with anything whatsoever!

As he strode along the corridor a snippet of a conversation, rendered discernible due to raised voices, coming from behind one of the doors, caught his ear and he involuntarily slowed down to listen, half-hating himself for doing so.

“ – either way you pay, Jared,” said a gleeful female voice.

Jensen’s eyebrows shot upwards.

“I will not be blackmailed, Genevieve,” growled Jared in response.

“No?” Miss Cortese laughed throatily. “But then what choice do you have?”

Jensen jumped out of his skin when something heavy thudded to the floor and quickly resumed his pace before he could be discovered lurking and eavesdropping.

He supposed, safely in his room a few moments later, that such was the problem with taking a mistress – there was always a possibility that she would blackmail you later on. Jensen shook his head. He was sorry to be involved in something so immoral and disgusting. However, he knew that he had brought it on himself by agreeing to enter a forbidden relationship with a man whose reputation as a libertine had been well known. It looked as though he had completely lost his way, his head and his heart the moment Jared re-entered his life.

Later that night when a rather irate Jared tried to gain access to Jensen’s room, he found it locked and barred against him.


	15. Chapter 15

Jensen needed to reflect on his present situation, on the choices that he had made of late, on what his life had come to, on what he had become – and there was only one place that he knew of that never failed to bring him peace and provide him with answers. He went to church. Thankfully, Jared must have drunk himself to sleep the night before for, according to his valet, he was out like a light. Jensen asked him to tell his master that he went to take a walk. Miss Cortese was nowhere to be seen.

Jensen had been somewhat apprehensive about attending one of the local churches for he had never heard anything good being said about the clergy of the metropolis. However, his apprehensions were appeased as soon as the sermon began and the minister addressed a rather thin congregation with an amiable smile and an air of perfect geniality that could not but dispose one to instantly like him. His words were wise, his voice soft, his manner warm and his message like a balm that Jensen, thirsty for moral guidance, drank like a dying man would drink a reviving draught from a healing spring.

He was sorry when the sermon was over, thinking it too short, and was surprised to see, upon looking about himself, people hastily leaving as though the building had caught fire and the roof was about to fall in. He remained seated in the pew he had chosen, staring with an enraptured eye at the walls depicting heavenly battles between good and evil and thinking over the minister’s words. He was so lost in his reverie that started rather violently when someone cleared his throat next to him and he looked up to see crinkled corners and animated blue eyes.

“Please, forgive me… I did not mean to startle you,” said the minister, smiling kindly upon him. “However, I had to speak to you. I had to tell you that I have rarely seen anyone among my flock display such genuine interest in a sermon before.”

Jensen blushed slightly. “It was a beautiful sermon and I was surprised to see the alacrity with which the others chose to leave. I wished to stay behind and savour it. Forgive me. I do not know your name. Reverend – ?”

“Collins,” replied the man. “At your service.”

Jensen introduced himself. Reverend Collins studied him in silence for a few moments.

“I can see that you are not ready to leave just yet. Please, join me then,” he said, waving his hand in the direction of a door concealed behind the altar. “Coffee?”

Jensen grinned.

“Yes, please!”

“Ah! A man after my own heart, I see.”

Reverend Collins took Jensen into a cramped but snug study, filled with books and candle stubs. The coffee pot was already on the cluttered table with a platter of cakes squeezed beside it.

“Divine aroma,” commented Jensen with a grin, eagerly sniffing the air.

His host chuckled. “My maid always brews a fresh pot for me to enjoy after the sermon,” he said, pouring out the coffee into mismatched cups that he had extracted from a likewise cluttered shelf. “I always need something potent to invigorate myself afterwards.”

Jensen nodded, thinking about how dispiritingly it must be to have such an ungrateful flock.

“Have you always thought that such would be your congregation?” he asked curiously as he accepted the cup and took the seat in one of the two armchairs.

“No, indeed,” replied Reverend Collins with a shake of his head. “I spent many years abroad, helping those in need in other countries. But I thought that it was now time for me to return home and make myself useful here. Naturally, I rather hoped to find myself a minister of a humble-sized parish somewhere in the picturesque part of the country, where my influence would be infinitely greater for my congregation would be much more devout. However,” he smiled genially, “I have taken it upon myself to do God’s work and if I am called forth to discharge my duty in metropolis rather than in the country than so be it. I prefer toil and would most likely grow too complacent in the country. Besides, I have faith that my efforts will be rewarded in the end.”

“I wished to enter orders myself not so long ago,” said Jensen musingly after a short pause.

Reverend Collins nodded as though he had somehow known it all along. “May I ask what made you change your mind?” His tone was gentle as though he was prodding at an open wound that would smart.

Jensen gave him a wry smile. “I did not lose my faith if that’s what you’re thinking,” he said. “However, I have made certain choices and undergone certain changes that made me ill-suited for the holy orders. I discovered that I am not the righteous man I thought I was. In short, I lost faith in my own self.” He grinned impishly at the preoccupied look on the other man’s face. “I did not commit treason or murder if that’s what you’re thinking,” he added.

Reverend Collins laughed and shook his head. “That is not what I am thinking.” He grew serious at once. “I am merely wondering what could have happened to make you change your mind and make you so hard upon yourself. I have been observing you all through the sermon and I can wholeheartedly attest that I have rarely met a person of such radiance, goodness, purity, beauty and unaffected piety.”

Jensen blushed and averted his gaze. He cleared his throat.

“My guardians kept telling me that I was too young to know what I truly wanted or needed. I didn’t know life and lacked experience and was throwing myself away by going into orders so young.” Jensen stopped to take a deep breath. “And then I met someone and embarked with that someone upon a journey of utter abandonment.”

“We have all been young and wild,” said Reverend Collins kindly. “It does not mean that you should give up on that which you feel so strongly about.”

Jensen shook his head. “There is no going back to what I used to be,” he said firmly. “I cannot deceive myself now that I know how susceptible I am to vice and sin. I cannot.” He hung his head before lifting up his eyes again, staring desperately at the minister. “I replaced everything that was good and right and moral and pious with pleasures of forbidden nature,” he confessed.

“I think your repentance and your pain should be taken into account when you judge yourself so severely,” replied the minister soothingly. “… _we have a religion from heaven which teaches us and requires us to live for heaven; but men are worldly beings and wish to lead worldly lives…_ ” he quoted. “Flesh is often weak but where there is a true strength of mind no poison can permanently touch it.”

“I do not know what my purpose is anymore,” said Jensen with a sigh. “Having a goal supplied me with a daily occupation and kept me from succumbing to idleness and indulgence. However, upon giving up my intention of becoming a clergyman, I have been nothing but idle and indulgent. I saw what such dissipated and unrestrained life does to men who can afford to do nothing but divert and amuse themselves. I do not want to be like them.” He shook his head. “I want to do something good and worthy.”

“But isn’t that all the more reasons to take orders?” asked Reverend Collins.

Jensen shook his head again and bit his lower lip.

“I always thought that teaching was good and worthy,” suggested the minister delicately, having studied him in silence for some time.

“Teaching!” exclaimed Jensen, astonished. “Why! I have never thought of that…”

“It is a noble occupation and one that is not too far removed from your original choice. Besides, having someone in your charge to take care of will keep you quite busy. I dare say that by instructing, tutoring, educating, counseling, supervising and, naturally, providing your own excellent example, you could do much good for a young gentleman from a wealthy family who would be otherwise exposed to pernicious influence either at home or abroad you have mentioned. However, if I may be so bold as to make another suggestion, I believe that a young man from a less fortunate family will benefit a great deal more from all of the above.”

Jensen pondered the matter, his eyes wide and bright with sudden possibilities.

“I do believe I have the means to do as you say,” he said at last. “I know that clergymen often take on students to supply their income. But I could do that as well. I do not want money. I was left a large house by my father and it has stood empty ever since I was taken in under my guardians’ wing. I could open a school there, couldn’t I?”

Reverend Collins beamed at him.

“Excellent idea!”

“It was your idea!”

Reverend Collins chuckled. “Well! I am greatly pleased to have been able to provide you with a solution for your hours of ennui.”

Jensen was looking gratefully at him when he was struck by a sudden thought. “I think I know just how to repay you!” he gasped.

“You do not need to repay me for anything. I am here to help in any manner I can.”

“I know that,” replied Jensen. “However, I do believe that there is something in my power to do about your situation. You see, before I gave up all notion of becoming a clergyman, I expected to succeed to a living which is in my guardian’s gift,” he said. “I want you to have it.”

Reverend Collins looked too shocked to speak.

“I will write to my guardian at once,” continued Jensen, putting down the cup and rising to his feet. “I’m sure he will have no objections when I tell him how amazing you are. In fact, I’m sure he will be only too happy to give you the living, knowing for certain that I have no more designs upon it. I mean, to be sure, it is occupied for the moment, but with an offer from elsewhere…” Jensen narrowed his eyes and slowly nodded. “Indeed. I shall put in a little hint for my guardian to catch... He is not too happy with our current minister and will be only too happy to get rid of him.”

“Jensen!” cried Reverend Collins, so overcome by emotions he quite forgot himself. “I cannot… this is too much…”

Jensen grinned.

“I want you to have it,” he said firmly. “Please do. We will be neighbours and friends! And you could help me with the school... Wouldn’t you like that?”

Reverend Collins smiled. “Your enthusiasm is overwhelmingly contagious and I cannot deny that the picture you paint is likewise extremely tempting. I believe I would love that very much indeed.”

Jensen beamed at him and promising to return on the morrow departed in excellent spirits.


	16. Chapter 16

His mood instantly soured upon entering the drawing-room and spotting Miss Cortese sitting in his favourite armchair by the fire with a magazine in her hands. So she was still here! Jared, who had been sitting in the other armchair, leapt to his feet the moment he saw Jensen enter. Jensen was astonished by his appearance – Jared looked awful.

His hair looked unkempt and disheveled, as though he had been repeatedly raking his hands through it, which was probably the case; his cravat was missing, his waistcoat was unbuttoned, his shirt was wrinkled and hanging carelessly out of his pantaloons. In fact, it looked as though Jared had not changed out of his clothes from the previous night – if the strong smell about him was any indication.

“Where were you?” he growled upon approaching Jensen and breathing heavily into his face.

Jensen caught a strong hint of brandy on his breath and wrinkled his nose. He wanted to put some distance between them but didn’t wish to antagonize Jared’s already ruffled spirits even further. He did raise an eyebrow at the question.

“I told your manservant to inform you that I was going to take a walk.”

“A walk! Where to? France?” snarled Jared before shaking his head and plunging his hands into his hair, tugging at the dirty strands.

Miss Cortese tittered from her armchair but they both ignored her.

“You were gone all morning! I didn’t know what to think! I thought you left!”

He made Jensen feel like a naughty child who had run away from his parent and broke his heart.

“I went to church,” he said quietly but firmly, looking squarely at Jared. He refused to be mocked for what he believed in.

Miss Cortese let out a loud cackle. “Church! I declare not the place I often grace with my presence.”

“You astonish me,” said Jensen coldly.

“Get out, Genevieve!” barked Jared, standing with his back to her, his expression murderous.

“La! Is it any way to talk to a lady?” she simpered.

“Well, you are no lady, are you? So I would advise you to remove yourself now before I kick you out.”

“How rude!”

But she left.

Jared then took Jensen in his arms. Jensen pressed his head into his neck and wrapped his arms around his back. He felt a tremendous desire to take care of him. He wanted to draw him a bath, take off his clothes, scrub his body clean, wash his hair, comb the tangled strands into orderliness and tie them with a ribbon at the nape of his neck. He could not stand to see him like this. He loved this man…

Unbidden, a sob burst out of his throat.

“Hush,” murmured Jared soothingly. “Hush, my love. Come and sit with me. Please.”

He stretched out his hand and, when after a moment’s hesitation Jensen took it, led him to the couch.

“You wouldn’t let me in last night,” he began as soon as they were seated. “I wished to talk to you. I wanted to explain.”

“We both know what would have happened if I had let you in,” said Jensen and shook his head. “I cannot – not with her in the house.”

Jared nodded, though he looked greatly aggrieved.

“Why did you go to church?” he asked after a few moments of tense silence.

“I needed to talk to someone.”

“You could have talked to me!”

Jensen snorted. “Jared, I was in need of moral guidance and words of wisdom from a disinterested source. I’m afraid you did not qualify on either account.”

Jared hummed.

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

Jensen’s expression instantly brightened. “Indeed, I have. Oh, you have no idea! I have made an acquaintance of the most wonderful man!”

Jared stared at him in utter astonishment but Jensen didn’t seem to notice as he began to talk breathlessly about an amazing clergyman that he had met.

“His sermon was beautiful and when he saw that I was in desperate need of counsel he invited me to his study to take coffee with him and gave me some excellent advice. I mean to write to your father and ask him to consider his candidature for the living I hope Dr Pileggi will very soon vacate. Surely he can’t wish to stay at St Anthony forever!”

“He seems to have made quite an impression on you,” said Jared sourly. “I mean to say, you wish to keep him nearby after only one morning spent in his company! Frankly, I never knew that one could have so much fun drinking coffee with a parson. I always considered clergymen extremely awkward and dull creatures.”

“Reverend Collins is nothing like that,” cried Jensen. “I’m sure you will like him when you meet him.”

“I’m sure I won’t. I quite detest the man. I wish you had never met him. Is he young?”

Jensen blinked at the unexpected question. “I fancy he is a few years older than you.”

Jared gritted his teeth. “I should have known that you would be drawn to older men.”

Jensen stared at him.

“Jared, what are you talking about? You can’t be seriously thinking that I am drawn to him.” Jensen shook his head. “You’re mad!”

“Indeed, I am. I am mad – with jealousy!”

“Jealousy?” spluttered Jensen. “Jared, this is ridiculous. I will be meeting other men – both younger and older – in the course of my life. Are you going to be jealous every time I make a new male friend? You can’t expect me not to, you know. You can’t expect to be the only man in my life.”

“I can expect you not to become so infatuated with your new friends so as to provide them with a living!”

“He is a worthy man. He deserves better than what he has been granted by his diocese!”

Jensen stood up and stormed out of the room. However, half-way down the hall he turned on his heels and marched back, fully intending to give Jared a piece of his mind.

He collided with Jared in the doorway just as the latter was going after him. Jared caught Jensen around the waist. Jensen was breathing heavily, pointing an accusing finger at Jared’s face.

“And speaking of jealousy – it is not my mistress who is currently living in the guest room,” he hissed.

“Genevieve is not my mistress,” replied Jared calmly, tightening his hold around Jensen. “I admit that she was my mistress during my prolonged stay in Italy. However, I terminated our relationship upon departing for England. I even left her with a nice sum of money that would have lasted her till the end of her natural life had she not squandered it all at the card table in a matter of months.”

“But what is she still doing here? Why didn’t you tell her to leave?” demanded Jensen.

Jared looked uneasy. “Jensen,” he said with a weary sigh, “you have to understand something. I have been – on many an occasion – open with her. I’m afraid she knows things about me that I would not wish to be made public. I will figure something out. I promise. Unfortunately, until I do, she will have to stay here, so that I can keep an eye on her and make sure that she keeps her tongue behind her teeth.”

“I don’t like it, Jared,” said Jensen quietly. “I don’t want her here.”

“I will get rid of her as soon as I can. Do you believe me?”

Jensen looked away. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

Before Jared could say another word, he slipped out of his embrace and fled. He avoided Jared for the rest of the day, finding excuses and pretexts to escape his company, avoiding his embraces and denying him access to his room once again.

“Jensen, don’t be a child. Just open the damn door! Let me in!”

“Jared, please, go... Just… go, please…”

He missed the intimacy that they had shared and craved to feel Jared’s touch on his naked flesh again, to tremble with caresses and kisses that Jared would so tenderly and liberally bestow upon him. But he would not succumb to temptation! It might have been poor consolation indeed that his will was strong enough to subjugate his desire, especially now that he had experienced its many pleasures, but it was a consolation none the less, and it was the only thing that he was left to hold on to as he fell asleep alone and miserable in his bed.

The next morning, after a tense and silent breakfast (Jared refused to talk to him), Jensen announced that he was going to take the letter to his guardian to the post-office. On his way back he called on Reverend Collins and met him in the doorway just as he was leaving the church.

“Jensen!” he exclaimed. “How good of you to come. I hoped you would. I was just on my way to take a walk. Will you join me?”

Jensen grinned. “It will be my pleasure.”

Together they set off along a noisy London street.

“I often draw inspiration for my sermons from observing people around me,” said Reverend Collins with so complacent an air it was as though he knew no higher bliss. “I like to watch them go about their daily business, whether it is a finely-dressed lady stepping out of her carriage to pay a call, a harassed-looking maid rushing along the street on her mistress’s errand, an elderly lady selling flowers in tatty gloves, a ragamuffin playing with a puppy in the mud or a handsome young officer ogling a passing-by damsel. I particularly like to observe their facial expressions when they think that no one is watching them for they never fail to tell a story. For instance, I can see that you are smiling indulgently at the old man’s ramblings but your eyes are clouded with worry and you look most preoccupied.”

Jensen sighed. “You are very observant.”

“I am sensing that you are still troubled and distressed and I am guessing that the reason lies in that someone you have mentioned before ... I understand that your feelings towards this person are quite acute. Is it what is troubling you?”

Jensen ducked his head.

“Partly, I guess. I have mostly reconciled myself to the strength and impropriety of my feelings. I knew from the outset that they were wrong and yet I pursued them as doggedly as I pursued my intention of becoming a clergyman prior to that. There’s a flaw in my character! I throw myself into things without reservation, going from one extreme to another, from leading a life of virtual sainthood to that of utter depravity.”

Reverend Collins gave him a gentle smile.

“I believe it is a universal flaw known as youth, Jensen. It is as turbulent as the sea during a storm. It can plunge us to the very bottom of the ocean or just as easily wash us ashore. It gives one all the energy in the world but it wants the sagacity of accumulated years.”

“I fear that not even all the years stretching before me will be able to change my nature or the nature of my feelings.”

“You speak like a young man of great sensitivity. First attachments are often the strongest. They inevitably leave some impression upon us: a memory, a mark, a lesson, or even a scar.”

“I doubt I will ever have room in my heart for another. Either way, I do not think that I can put my heart through such trials again.”

His companion chuckled.

“You are an extremely determined young man; serious, sedate and steadfast beyond your years. I can readily see you willing yourself to love one person all your life.”

“I have given up much for that. My principles, morals, convictions... I might as well stick with it.”

“Giving our heart and loving someone should not be treated as a burden that we have to carry or a penance that we have to pay for our sins,” said his companion gravely.

Jensen shook his head. “It matters not. I have no reason to doubt the strength or the duration of my attachment.”

“Ah.”

“I mean,” he added in some confusion, “I do not have any reason to doubt the strength of that person’s attachment either. I do not think. However, I – ”

Jensen broke off when a horse, neighing and rearing, appeared out of nowhere and cut across their path. Jensen sprang back, shielding the reverend by flinging out his arm to prevent him from making another step, and when the danger seemed to have passed, and he looked up in order to reprimand the rider for his carelessness, he gasped –

“Jared!”

Jared was breathing as furiously as his steed, towering above them like a storm cloud.

“Jared, what is the meaning of this?”

“I’d like to know that myself. You are a long way from the post-office, Jensen,” he said with a sneer, his voice cold and mocking.

Jensen bristled.

“You would know that the post-office was not my sole destination had you not treated me with coldness and silence at breakfast.”

“I would have treated you differently had you not behaved yourself like a child!”

Jensen caught Reverend Collins’s shocked expression and tried to compose himself, appalled at the notion of what their argument must look like to such an observant man. A veritable lovers’ spat!

“I see you are enjoying a walk with your new friend,” jeered Jared as though quite unaware that he was causing a shocking scene in the middle of the street.

Jensen coloured when he realized just how many eyes had been drawn to them at that moment.

“Mr Collins,” he said with insurmountable effort and what dignity he could muster, “let me introduce you to Mr Jared Padalecki. He is the only son of my guardians. I can assure you that he doesn’t always behave himself like a barbarian and that his current conduct should not be regarded as reflection upon them for they are wonderful people.”

Reverend Collins inclined his head and pronounced the usual pleasantries expected on the occasion.

“I have heard much about you,” said Jared with that same sneering expression on his contorted with rage face. “Jensen is quite in love with you, do you know that?”

“Jared!” Jensen could not believe his ears. “How dare you!”

“He wouldn’t stop talking about you all evening yesterday.”

“I must confess that I am greatly fond of him myself,” said Reverend Collins pleasantly.

“Well then!” Jared threw a fierce look at Jensen. “Why don’t you invite your excellent friend to have dinner with us then?” he asked with a challenge in his voice. “I want an opportunity to get to know him better myself, seeing as how we are all friends here.”

Jensen glared at him.

“I would have gladly issued an invitation, Jared,” he gritted out. “However, I refuse to subject Mr Collins to the presence of Miss Cortese.”

“But surely such a great man would not look down upon or refuse to know a wretched woman who is obliged to get by in this cruel world as well as she can.”

“Well, you like her so much! Why don’t you go and enjoy her company then?”

“Excellent notion!” cried Jared, viciously pulling on the reins and making his horse rear on its hind legs again. “At least she doesn’t keep her bed-chamber barred against me!”

Jensen’s eyes widened in horror. Jared turned around and without another word galloped away, forcing people in his path to scramble out of the way, in danger of being trampled.

Jensen shook his head, closed his eyes against the vicious sting of tears and balled his hands into fists.

“God! I hate the man!” he burst out. “I hate him so much!”

“Do you really?” asked a soft, sympathetic voice close by. “Come,” said Reverend Collins kindly when Jensen gaped at him. “I think we have provided sufficient entertainment for the on-lookers. Let us return to the church.”

Jensen kept his eyes firmly on the ground as they waded their way through the crowd. Upon entering the minister’s study, he promptly fell into an armchair, flung away his hat and clutched his hair as though fully intending to tear it out.

“Jensen, stop that,” chided Reverend Collins gently. “Please, look at me.”

Jensen shook his head. “I can’t. Don’t ask me. What must you think of me now! You must hate or at the very least despise me. I know that.”

“I do not hate nor do I despise you, Jensen,” replied his companion. “However, I fully understand your predicament now.”

“I dare say you haven’t expected to discover such abomination,” said Jensen bitterly, his insides writhing with shame.

“I confess to have been exceedingly puzzled at first. It was quite a conundrum for I could not understand what could have possibly made such a fine young man look at himself with so much loathing so as to force him to turn his back on his calling. That it was an illicit affair I had no doubt. However, it had not occurred to me that another man was involved.”

Tears of mortification were rolling down Jensen’s face now.

“You obviously care deeply for him and from what I have had an occasion to observe of his behaviour – however rude and provoking – I would say that he cares deeply for you as well. In fact, I believe that the strength and the depth of your feelings for each other are so violent that you have trouble controlling and mastering them without falling into jealousy, rage, threats and accusations. I assume you have not been long involved in this particular fashion nor have you been exposed much to the company of those you would consider a danger to your relationship. However, I dare say that with time, assuming, of course, that you overcome such calamities as you are facing now, that volatile passion will subside into tranquility and tenderness that will not be so easily shaken.”

Jensen lifted his eyes and stared at him.

“How can you speak so calmly of such unnatural things?” he asked in amazement, not daring to believe that he had not been cast away with curses and damnations thrown at his back. “Why aren’t you appalled at the mere notion of such abominable depravity? How come you aren’t telling me that a man cannot be in love with another man? Why aren’t you condemning me and carting me off to a madhouse or a prison?”

“I think you are doing enough condemnation and castigation as it is,” said Reverend Collins composedly. “I am not going to contribute to your self-castigation and self-destruction. Jensen, you are a good man and despite your particular predilections, which I shall not question or judge, you remain a deeply devout one. It is my job as a friend to soothe you and provide you with counsel and that is what I am going to do. However, if you do not stop your histrionics, I might have to resort to drastic measures and slap you.”

That elicited a giggle from Jensen.

“Now, I understand that something has arisen to put doubts in your mind on Jared’s account and I assume that it has everything to do with Miss Cortese for you have mentioned her name with a great deal of ire – among other things. I do not wish to distress you even further when your spirits are already so much shaken, however, may I enquire whether it is that you came to doubt Jared’s faithfulness with her under your roof?”

Jensen bit his lip but shook his head almost at once.

“I hardly know how to explain what bothers me so,” he slowly replied. “I do not believe that he cares much for her or wishes to resume their past association. Jared told me before the start of our relationship that he should never marry because no woman has what it takes to be his lifelong companion. I well understand his meaning now and I believe him. But her arrival came as a shock. I mean, to be sure, Jared told me on numerous occasions that he’d had both mistresses and lovers in the past and I’d heard enough of his reputation to know that he had led a life of dissipation and libertinism. However, I never expected his past to intrude upon our present and such a delicate one as it is!”

Jensen stood up and began to pace the tiny room, waving his arms in a distracted fashion and causing more than one pile of books to tumble down to the floor and scatter at his feet.

“He says that she must stay because she knows too much about his past indiscretions to allow her to leave without satisfying her financial demands, which, I understand, he does not mean to do. But what if there are others like her who will descend upon us next, asking either for money or shelter in order to keep his secrets safe? He told me once that he had made some questionable choices in the past and that they had almost brought scandal upon his family – that’s why he spent so many years abroad! But now he’s back and all his former lovers and mistresses are a potential threat to our future. I’m not sure I can deal with that! How many secrets can one man have?”

“I’m afraid he is the only one who can answer that.”

Jensen snorted bitterly. “Except he wouldn’t talk! I remember coming upon one such secret and he changed the subject so abruptly!” He took his face in his hands and realized that his cheeks were soaked in tears he didn’t remembered shedding. “I feel more tainted by his past than by those intimate acts, however forbidden and unnatural they are, that we’ve committed together,” he confessed quietly, squeezing his eyes shut.

Reverend Collins sighed before he spoke again.

“The question is whether you consider his past secrets and associations sufficient reason to give him up,” he said softly.

Jensen’s eyes flew open and he stared at him in horror mingled with incomprehension.

Reverend Collins smiled.

“I see the idea has not occurred to you. Very well; in this case, I think the only thing you can do is to be open with him about what truly vexes you. I’m afraid that there will always be danger of extortion or exposure where there are secrets to be kept. Alas, unless he confides in you those that are potentially harmful, neither of you will have any peace of mind.”

It was with a sense of profound dread that Jensen made his way back home. His mind was burdened with thoughts and reflections that had a potential to explode at the slightest provocation and he knew that if Jared continued to conduct himself in the same obnoxious and irrational manner then another row was inevitable.

His astonishment was therefore great indeed when upon his arrival he was instantly greeted by Jared’s warm embrace and repeatedly murmured words of “ _Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me...”_ whispered tenderly into his ear, followed by feathery light kisses of repentance. Jensen sighed with relief and eagerly nuzzled into his neck, breathing in his scent, shuddering and going limp in his arms.

“I lost my head,” continued Jared, feverishly running his hands up and down Jensen’s back and sides. “I should have never embarrassed and humiliated you in front of the reverend. I’d rather be hanged than consider entering Genevieve’s bedchamber ever again. I thought you should know.”

Jensen chuckled. “Don’t be quite so melodramatic,” he teased.

“Unless,” added Jared, “it is to tell her to get out.”

Jensen hummed in reply.

“Here,” said Jared softly, giving him a small folded piece of paper.

Jensen took it. “What is it?”

“Your mother’s address in town.”

“What?” Jensen stared from the piece of paper to Jared in disbelief. “You found her?” he breathed out.

Jared nodded and laughed when Jensen launched himself at him and wound his arms around his neck. “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!”

“Do not get me wrong. I am pleased by your exuberance. However, I seem to remember being promised a kiss – on the mouth – when I found her.”

Jensen instantly blushed and turned his face to the side. “Jared...”

“I’m afraid I must insist, darling. After all, a promise is a promise…”

He took Jensen’s chin in between his fingers and turned his face so that he could look him in the eye. Jensen’s breathing accelerated and he began to tremble as Jared cradled his face in his palms, ever so slowly bringing his own face down to meet his. It felt like an eternity of heartbeats and breaths…

Jensen froze when Jared’s mouth finally touched his. It was just a soft press of Jared’s lips against his lips, but it felt like nothing he had ever experienced before. Jensen held his breath, unsure what he should do, his heart drumming in his chest, when Jared began to move his lips against his before tracing them playfully with his tongue. Jensen gasped when Jared’s tongue pried his lips open, thus giving him unimpeded access to plunge inside.

His face clutched in Jared’s hands, Jensen could do nothing but submit to the attack that swept across his mouth, invading and plundering its every nook and cranny – until it occurred to him to push back and plunge his own tongue into Jared’s mouth. He could feel Jared’s mouth break into a wide grin just as the fierce battle of tongues ensued.

By the time they broke apart, catching their breaths and clutching at each other for support, Jensen felt that his lips were as swollen as though they had been stung by bees. He looked up at Jared with eyes as round as platters and tentatively licked his mouth. Jared growled and hungrily took his mouth again; licking, nibbling, sucking and biting until his lips were positively raw.


	17. Chapter 17

Jensen clutched the folded piece of paper with his mother’s address in his trembling hand as he hurried along the street towards her place after breakfast the next day. It was a rather poor but respectable part of town and Jensen was relieved that his mother could afford a living there. His heart was thumping in his chest and his mind was filled with multitude of questions. What did one say on such an occasion? How did one introduce oneself to one’s mother after a passage of a decade, having been abandoned by her as a child? Would a mere card suffice? Jensen hoped that his mother would want to see him. But what if she didn’t? After all, she had not tried to contact him once since she left.

Jensen’s heart made its biggest leap yet when he realized, much to his astonishment, that he had arrived at his destination. Taking a deep, fortifying breath, he knocked on the door and waited, clutching the address so tightly it was turning to dust in his fist. A maid opened the door and Jensen found himself unable to say a word. He stuttered and gasped for air like a fish out of water, before he finally shut his mouth and shoved the card at her. Her eyes fell upon the name on the card and a loud intake of breath followed; she gaped at Jensen before squeaking and saying that she would ask if her mistress would see him. Then, throwing another look of shock at him, she scurried off, leaving Jensen to stare at the shabby front door.

His heartbeat having gone up another notch, he waited with bated breath for her return. Will his mother see him? Or will she turn him away without acknowledging? He experienced both relief and trepidation when the maid reappeared and told him to follow her. Jensen nodded, swallowed and proceeded up a narrow, lopsided staircase that zigzagged and tilted sideways and creaked horribly beneath his boots, clutching the railing and dreading what he would find upon entering his mother’s apartment.

However, he was ushered into a small, tidy room, uncluttered by furniture and quite empty of books, with warmth coming from the fire in the grate, white curtains fluttering merrily on the windows and a sweet sort of scent hanging in the air. He gave his hat and his walking stick to the maid, who curtsied and left.

“Jensen,” said a soft voice, filled with tears.

Jensen peered into the gloom of the room, pierced by a single beam of sunlight and dotted with infinite motes of dust, before he finally spotted a frail-looking woman in a cap and a morning dress sitting in an old armchair by the fire, a work basket in her lap.

“Please, please, dear, come in.” She indicated a chair. “Come sit with me, child. Let me have a good look at you.”

Jensen walked across the room, drew the chair closer to her and sat down, staring at his mother for the first time in ten years. It occurred to him that he must have completely erased her features from his memory. He did not know her, did not remember her…

“Jensen,” she said in a tremulous voice, stretching out a trembling hand towards him. “My dear son.”

He took it in his. “Mother,” he said stiffly.

The woman in front of him smiled faintly as she gazed into his face. She was thin and pale but with high colour in her cheeks. Her faded straw-coloured hair was neatly arranged underneath her cap and her luminous eyes were almost too large for her haggard face. Jensen wondered if she was consumptive and whether Jared knew a good physician in town. He saw at a glance that there was very little of her former beauty left about her and could not quite determine how much of resemblance they actually shared, considering that everyone always told him that he looked exactly like her.

“Jensen,” she repeated his name again as though in a reverie. “I did not believe when Betty told me who was at the door,” she said with a shake of her head. “How could I? I never dreamt of seeing you again.” She paused and looked at him some more. “Upon my word, you have grown into such a beautiful young man. Of course,” she added with a sudden girlish simper, “I was once considered a great beauty myself. I certainly know where you get your good looks from!”

“How come you never came to see me?” choked out Jensen. “Never once wrote to me?”

His mother’s face fell. “I promised your father I never would,” she said in a whisper, looking away.

“But after his death?” persisted Jensen.

“Jensen, dear, how could I?” she exclaimed, now staring imploringly at him. “I was forever barred from all good society. I had to leave my home, my sphere. I had to rely on those friends of mine who had not turned their backs on me. I could not appear out of nowhere and ruin your life after a scandal I had caused! I thought it was better this way. I knew that Sherri and Gerald would take good care of you. They are good people and they always treated you with great affection. I, on the other hand, had to take care of myself and the baby growing inside of me.”

Jensen started at the mention of the baby. He had almost forgotten. He never even knew whether he had a half-brother or sister.

“Thankfully,” continued his mother, “I had help from another quarter. The man I betrayed your father with settled an annuity upon me and provided for the child when she was born.”

“She?” stammered Jensen. “I have a sister?” he asked in wonder.

His mother smiled and nodded vigorously. “She is just as pretty as you are. Would you like to meet her? I shall send for her this instant.” She reached out for the bell but Jensen stopped her by placing his hand upon her wrist.

“Mother, why – why did you do it?” he asked. “Why did you betray father? Why did you ruin all our lives?”

Her hand fell lifelessly into her lap. “Jensen…”

“Please, mother,” entreated Jensen with a jerk of his head. “I must know. My whole life has been blighted by what you have done. I need to know!”

She looked at him for a long time.

“I would not expect you to understand why I did what I did. However,” she added after another pause, “I believe I owe you the truth. You must know that your father married rather late in life and his main objective in marrying me – much younger and much prettier too – was to produce an heir who would inherit the fortune that he had managed to accumulate despite his ancestors’ squandering ways.”

Jensen frowned at that rather cold description of the man he had always thought very highly of.

“Do not misunderstand me,” said his mother gently, catching the sight of his perturbation. “Your father was not an unkind or an ungenerous man but he did lack passion and as soon as I gave him a son he lost any interest in me. I had fulfilled my duty. He did not care for me anymore. But I was young and pretty and full of unfulfilled ambitions and desires. A coquette I was often called. Your father wouldn’t even attend dance parties! He seemed to have no mortal desires beyond those connected with his heir and his fortune. His only visitors were the Padaleckis. He doted on you. Everything that he did was done in order to secure your future happiness. He adored you. How he spoilt you! He could not stand to lose you out of sight. I, on the other hand, spent years being neglected and overlooked, shut up in that huge house of his with barely a friend to drop by, having left most of them behind upon my marriage, due to their lower social standing, you understand. I might not have been in my right mind when I started the affair but I saw no point in resisting the temptation. Your father was not interested in me – but that young man certainly was!”

“How can you say that?” demanded Jensen. “How can you say that father wasn’t interested in you? He died of a broken heart!”

His mother scoffed. “It wasn’t a broken heart that killed your father, Jensen! It was his pride!”

“His pride? What do you mean?”

“I mean that you know only the embellished version of the events but not the actual truth. Your father challenged the man I betrayed him with to a duel. Such a foolish thing to do! He was never a good shot. But his pride was injured and he would not stand for that. We all tried to talk him out of it but he wouldn’t listen. Oh! He had quite a temper, he did. They fought. Your father was injured. Alas, his injury proved fatal in the end.”

Jensen couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Why had no one ever told him?

“And what of the other man?” he asked, overcome by sudden fury.

“A bullet grazed his arm, I think, but he survived. His family, his friends urged him most ardently to flee the country; afraid of what a scandal it would be if the duel became public knowledge; afraid of the repercussions. He left before he knew of your father’s death or of the child I was with. However, he didn’t abandon me entirely to my miserable fate upon learning of it, and while I was shunned by society and was obliged to spend the rest of my days in shame and obscurity, I could live comfortably enough on the money that he settled upon me. Much reduced in circumstances, of course, but not destitute.”

Jensen was horrified by her words – by the truth for years concealed from him! It struck him rather forcibly at that moment that had he gone with his original plan to take a wife upon his ordination he would have doomed her to a similarly unenviable fate. He had never regarded marriage as anything other than his duty before God and society to produce an heir, though with an additional ambition – selfish and self-serving he could clearly see that now – of elevating some plain and penniless girl from obscurity into gentility. But at what price? Utter loss of freedom on her part? Utter neglect on his? He never thought of her in this arrangement as anything other than a necessary component. He would have made a very poor husband indeed.

He was startled by the touch of his mother’s hand on his.

“Jensen, I did not mean to upset you, dear. I am sorry you had to find it out. I expect it has been most painful to hear such disagreeable things about your father. I dare say you must have held him in great esteem as opposed to your fallen mother. However, back then we judged it best not to tell you the whole truth. You were so young…”

Jensen nodded, though he found that he could not speak due to a large lump that had formed in his throat.

“Now, how would you like to meet your sister?” she asked kindly as though impatient to change the subject.

Jensen nodded. His mother eagerly rang the bell and when her maid arrived told her to ask her little princess to come down and meet their special guest. Then she turned back to Jensen with another soft smile.

“Her name is Mackenzie,” she said, her voice filled with motherly tenderness and pride.

Jensen waited with a fresh wave of trepidation for his half-sister to join them, though when she did, she appeared even more petrified to be subjected to the stranger’s scrutiny than he was. Her mother quickly took her in her lap and in a soothing manner informed her that Jensen was her big brother, at which point the girl’s eyes widened almost comically and her mouth opened to form an ‘o’ of astonishment as she gazed in fascination at him.

Mackenzie was an extremely pretty child of about nine, neatly dressed, with thick sunshine-kissed hair braided on either side of her sweet face. Jensen could easily see the resemblance he was said to share with his mother in her features. However, her eyes, while as bright green as theirs, were not as large, and though not unfamiliar, Jensen could not quite place where the familiarity he caught in their shape was coming from. He instantly regretted that he had spent so little time in his own house as to forget the faces and the peculiar features of his ancestors, whose portraits lined the walls there. His father had commissioned his mother’s portrait upon their marriage and he knew that later there had been other portraits made, mainly in order to immortalize and elevate her branch of the family.

“Oh, I am so happy you have finally had the chance to meet!” exclaimed their mother in raptures. “This is just what I have always wished for! Jensen,” she addressed him with a sudden gleam of determination in her eyes, “I am leaving tomorrow to visit a dear old friend in the country; she has been complaining of poor health and there is no one to wait on her, wretched thing. Kenzie is remaining here with Betty to look after her. I do not want to take her in case my friend’s condition is too grave, you know. I was wondering if you could come and keep her company for a few hours every day. Maybe take her for a walk in the park. I’m sure you will be pleased to have the chance to get to know each other better.”

Jensen was startled by the request but nodded in agreement.

“By the by,” continued his mother, now positively beaming at him, “Kenzie is raving about going to Exeter Exchange. Why, she is simply dying to see its famous menagerie. All she can talk about these days, I declare! Do you think you could take her there by any chance?”

“Of course.”

Jensen smiled when his sister beamed at him too, her eyes alight with excitement, despite something not unlike anxiety settling in his stomach at the prospect.

*

In fact, Jensen had been quite intimidated by the task of keeping his sister’s company in their mother’s absence for he had never been in the position of amusing children before. Mr and Mrs Padalecki had no younger children, and though they had relatives who had, they preferred to visit rather than to receive them in their own house in order to avoid rowdiness and disorder, cessation of all peace and disruption of all employment one usually associated with having small children within one’s household.

However, he remembered that Jared was rather good at that when Jensen was a child. He was, therefore, quite dismayed and not a little offended when Jared flatly refused to accompany him and help him out, telling him that he did not wish to interfere and citing all the places where he suddenly had to be.

It was with another bout of apprehension that Jensen approached his mother’s lodgings again. He was just in time to hand her into the chaise and receive her assurances (after she had laughed at the terrified look upon his face) that he would be perfectly fine and that his sister was not a terrible monster he should fear to face one on one.

A quarter of an hour later, Jensen had to admit that his mother had been right. Mackenzie was affectionate and extremely chatty now that she knew Jensen to be her brother and, apparently, at her disposal, ready to fulfill her every fancy. He also discovered that she was quite headstrong and independent for when he suggested going to the park she refused to be dressed by Betty (“I am not a child!”) and proceeded to tie her bonnet and button her coat and put on her gloves and shoes without anyone’s assistance. Then, extremely pleased and proud with herself upon receiving Jensen’s warm praise, she told him that she was ready to go outside and enjoy their _promenade_.

“Mamma says I should always look smart in case I meet a beau,” she told him very seriously as they stepped outside, hand in hand, blinking in the bright sun that accosted them after the darkness of the hall. “I think having a beau will be very exciting. He will be rich, of course, and will take me out in his barouche. Mamma says to be careful, though, for they can break my heart. Well! I will just have to break theirs first, right?”

Jensen blinked. “I guess mother would know more about it than I do,” he found himself stammering at last.

“I suppose you are right.” Mackenzie drew a deep sigh. “It is such a great pity that you are my brother. You are so very pretty and so smartly dressed you would make a very fine beau. Do you have a barouche?” she asked before Jensen could find anything to say to the first part of her speech.

“I’m afraid I don’t. However, I imagine I would promptly purchase one for such a fine lady like you.”

“Mamma says that I must marry well and that I definitely will, what with my looks and poise, as long as I play my cards right. But she hasn’t taught me how to play cards yet. Do you play?”

By this point Jensen had trouble keeping his face straight. “A little,” he admitted, his mouth twitching.

“I dare say a little is better than nothing. I’m sure you can teach me while mamma is away. Can you just imagine her surprise? Why, she will be ever so astonished when she returns and finds out that I can!”

Jensen nodded, privately resolving to revise his sister’s education and teach her something other than how to be the biggest flirt in the kingdom in a few years’ time. Nevertheless, he found himself enjoying his sister’s company (her constant prattle about beaux and her auspicious marriage prospects included) and they spent a very pleasant morning walking in the park, visiting the menagerie and eating ices.

In the course of their walk Jensen learnt that Mackenzie knew that she was the natural daughter of a gentleman but that she didn’t know anything else about him. Her mamma was teaching her embroidery, drawing, painting, singing and dancing. Mackenzie wanted to learn to play the pianoforte, for that was what all accomplished ladies did, but her mamma could not afford an instrument. She could count, read and write and mamma promised to send her a letter (she had never received a letter before).

On their way home Jensen suggested stopping at the subscription library and borrowing a book of Mackenzie’s choosing, insisting that any young lady who wished to be called accomplished had to develop her mind and understanding by reading something other than beauty advertisements in ladies’ magazines; he had previously learnt that this had been her main school in this respect. Mackenzie didn’t question her big brother’s authority and, looking up to him for guidance, chose a book of Aesop’s fables.


	18. Chapter 18

Jensen was quite surprised when he realized that the first week of his mother’s absence had swept by (marked by the arrival of her highly-anticipated letter to Mackenzie), filled with little things and tasks that he set up for himself and his sister. They took daily walks and read together, and when it was time for her usual occupations, he was there to supervise them, even though he could neither instruct nor assist her in those traditional female employments that she was taught by her mother and by her mother’s maid in her absence. However, he chose to spend that time teaching her the word of God of which she proved to be utterly ignorant.

Jensen was also surprised by how well they got along, how much genuine pleasure he received from instructing and spending time with her, how greatly his sister seemed to enjoy his company and how eagerly took to following his advice.

The only drawback was that he spent very little time with Jared these days. Jared complained about it one evening when the second week of Jensen’s mother’s absence had come to an end and she was yet to announce her plans for return.

“Well, you have no one to blame but yourself,” pointed out Jensen, shuddering at the warm touch of Jared’s lips against the side of his neck. “I don’t know why you insist on staying behind whenever I go to spend time with my sister. You might as well get used to the child’s presence.”

Jared snorted as he planted another kiss in a long and very distracting series of kisses just below Jensen’s jawline. “I see no occasion for that. If I wanted a child, I would take a wife.”

“Jared,” said Jensen suddenly in so grave a manner that Jared halted and stared at him in bemusement. “I mean to remove my mother and sister to my house in St Anthony. They will be staying with me from now on.”

Jared’s bemusement increased. “Is this a joke?” he asked, grinning at him.

Jensen looked affronted. “Does it sound like one?”

Jared raised an eyebrow. “It certainly does. What madness is this?”

“What is so mad about my wish to take care of my mother and sister?” demanded Jensen, drawing away from him.

“Half-sister,” pointed out Jared.

“What does it matter? We share one parent. That is enough for me.”

“I thought you said they were well provided for by the father of the child.”

“But that is hardly enough! They live in a tiny apartment and mother is molding my sister into a perfect flirt! I cannot stand by and do nothing when it is quite in my power to change that. I can provide them with a house of their own and make sure that my sister receives a proper education. She is not unintelligent and has already displayed a potential to grow into a smart young woman if mother would only care to develop her other faculties.”

Jared pushed a hand through his hair. “But wouldn’t it be better to leave everything the way it is?” he asked. “From your words on the subject I understood that they are not displeased with their situation in life. Jensen,” he said soothingly when Jensen had opened his mouth to object, “I’m sorry but I do not think that you will be doing them any favours by uprooting them from the place where they have already built their life and removing them back to the place where your mother’s disgrace will become the talk of the neighbourhood again.”

Jensen could not believe his ears. He had been certain that Jared of all people would understand; would support his plan!

“I think she has already paid more than her share for her disgrace,” he bit back.

“I’m afraid society will not agree with you there,” said Jared with a shake of his head. “A disgraced woman will always remain a disgraced woman in their eyes however fleeting and insignificant her indiscretion might have been. But with a child to serve as a constant reminder! You cannot expect them not to talk.”

“Her indiscretion?” asked Jensen, taking a deep breath and barely containing himself from raising his voice into a screech. “And what of his indiscretion? I don’t see the man who brought about her ruin suffering the same consequences or paying for his indiscretion too!”

“I thought he has been paying all these years.”

“I don’t mean money, Jared! No one condemns him! No one expects him to leave society for good!”

“He did leave the country.”

“He fled the country because he was afraid to take responsibility for his actions!” bellowed Jensen into his face. “How can you blame her and yet absolve him? How can you so blindly obey society’s dictums in her case when you yourself would have been at the very least ostracized by it had your predilection for your own sex become public knowledge? How do you not see that not all those who break the rules imposed by society deserve the punishment they receive and not all those who deserve the punishment receive it?”

“Jensen,” said Jared in a quelling voice, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “I do not wish to quarrel.”

“Then don’t!” implored Jensen with tears in his eyes. “Jared, I can’t leave them to their fate now that I know how difficult it is! Now that I know that I can be of help, of use to them. I am the head of the family and I will do what I believe and know is right. I am not asking for your permission. This is my mother and sister we’re talking about. My sister is a gentleman’s daughter and she must be brought up as such. I must take care of them.”

Jared drew him into his arms and held him tight when Jensen tried to break free. “I know you do,” he said softly, kissing the top of his head before tucking it securely under his chin. “Forgive me for suggesting otherwise.”

Despite Jared’s capitulation in the end, their conversation left Jensen shaken and unsure and he resolved to consult both Mrs Padalecki and Reverend Collins on the matter at the earliest opportunity.

*

The next morning he went to spend time with Mackenzie later than usual. On one hand, he expected that Mackenzie had finally received a letter from mother and was busy composing her reply; it had been a few days late now according to her calculations and she was keen to know whether the soreness in her throat of which mother had been complaining in her last had finally abated or whether it was that which had been keeping her from writing.

On the other hand, Jared would not let him leave the bed until he had kissed, licked, nibbled and sucked on every inch of his body, using a rare opportunity that they were quite alone to do as they pleased. Miss Cortese had been attending a private ball the night before in a house of one of the ladies of the demimonde from which she had yet to return and at which Jared hoped she would find herself a wealthy patron to keep her and would finally leave him in peace.

Upon approaching his mother’s lodgings, Jensen was surprised to see Betty outside, pacing in front of the house, wringing her hands, her cheeks blotchy and her eyes puffy, a crumpled piece of paper in her hands. As soon as she saw him, she began to speak and cry at the same time, making her words entirely unintelligible.

Jensen, afraid that something had befallen Mackenzie, seized her roughly by the shoulders and ordered her to compose herself and to tell him what had happened harsher than he had ever spoken in his entire life. However, when she had finally managed to get it all out through sobs and sniffs and hiccoughs that wracked her body, Jensen wished that she hadn’t.

His mother was dead.

“It was putrid fever!” screeched her maid. “It took her friend and it took my mistress and it took half of the village with them!”

It was so sudden; so final; so incomprehensible. How could it be?

Jensen shook his head. He was too numb with shock to understand or to feel much of anything at the moment and it wasn’t until he heard Mackenzie’s heart-wrenching wails coming from the open window upstairs that he charged through the door and into the parlour above.

He found his sister in agony of inconsolable grief; she was moving backwards and forwards in her chair, screaming at the top of her lungs, clutching a sodden handkerchief in her trembling hands.

The handkerchief slipped through her fingers when she saw him and with another horrible howl launched herself at him, clutching at his midriff and soaking his greatcoat with tears. Jensen held her tight with one arm while he picked up the handkerchief with the other in order to hang it on the fire to dry. He hardly knew what soothing nonsense he was whispering to the heartbroken child when the initials, comprised of three familiar letters embroidered on the silk handkerchief, caught his eye and he stared.

“Kenzie… where did you get it?” he croaked the next moment, barely recognizing his voice; his throat would not work properly. “Where did you get this handkerchief? Kenzie?”

“Mamma – said – it – belonged – to – my – father,” choked out the child.

Jensen’s blood turned cold.

His sister’s father was… Jared.

He swayed where he stood, struggling to understand. However, his sister’s needs were a priority. That was the first rational thought that had finally managed to overcome Jensen’s numbness and confusion and prevail upon him to act. He told Betty to pack Mackenzie’s things and find a chaise to take them away. He had just enough presence of mind to offer to retain her as Mackenzie’s maid once they left London and upon receiving her instant consent told her that he would send for her once everything was ready for their departure. He then addressed his full attention to the child, slumped limply in the chair; she had cried herself hoarse and was now rubbing her fisted hands over her face that was so red and swollen it appeared to be covered in thick rash.

Jensen scooped her up in his arms when the chaise had arrived and began to descend a dark, narrow, crooked staircase as slowly and carefully as he could so as not to fall down and break both their necks. Mackenzie had fallen asleep in his arms by the time they had arrived at their destination. Jensen carried her into the house and ignoring Jared’s exclamations of surprise and queries that naturally followed, ordered a room to be immediately prepared for his sister next to his. He then deposited her there, and leaving a maid to watch over her until his return, marched downstairs to the drawing-room, his expression stony; the silk handkerchief bearing Jared’s initials clutched in his shaking fist.

“Jensen, what is going on? Your sister… is she hurt?” asked Jared worriedly. “Has she taken a fall?”

Jensen threw such a venomous look at him that Jared staggered.

“Her mother died of putrid fever,” he hissed viciously, his hands shaking worse than ever. “I would have brought her here anyway, for she has no place to go, but considering that it is her father’s house after all, it seems only right, don’t you think?”

From the corner of his eye Jensen caught sight of Miss Cortese. She was covering her wide mouth with her hand, having emitted a high-pitched noise that sounded like something between a hastily stifled giggle and a hiccough.

“I guess the big secret is out,” she tittered.

“GET OUT!” roared Jared, rounding on her. “Get your things and get out of my house and sight!”

Miss Cortese raised her arms in a gesture of surrender. “Hold your horses, Jared… I shall be gone in a jiffy.”

Jared glowered at her.

“By the by, Genevieve, do not even think of coming back to blackmail me ever again. If I hear so much as half a rumour about anything – anything at all – concerning Jensen or his sister or mother or me, I will tell everyone I know that you are a pox-ridden whore and that they should stay as far away from you as possible for their own good. I will make sure that you end your miserable days living in the street, selling your teeth and hair for a crust of mouldy bread.”

Jared turned back to Jensen as soon as Miss Cortese swept away in a rustle of skirts, looking properly horrified and frightened.

“Jensen – ” he began and his voice and gaze were the epitome of utmost tenderness again.

Jensen shook his head and dropped the handkerchief on the floor between them; he had been clenching his jaws so tightly it was a miracle that he managed to open his mouth to speak.

“Mackenzie said that it belonged to her father,” he said savagely. “Imagine my shock when I saw your initials embroidered there – just the way your mother usually embroiders them. I have seen her at it a thousand times!”

“Jensen – ”

“That old scar on your upper arm.” He smiled bitterly. “I remember you telling me that you got it as a result of a hunting accident. But there was no hunting accident, was there?” Jensen shook his head. “No, of course not. Instead you got it as a result of a duel – a duel that you fought with my father! A duel that ended with his death and your fleeing the country in order to avoid scandal! That’s why you didn’t want me to take them back with me… that’s why you wanted to leave things the way they were… the way they suited you! You didn’t want me to know the truth. Well, thanks for giving me my mother’s address at last. Funny how long it took you to procure it, considering that you knew exactly where she lived!”

“Jensen, please,” cried Jared desperately. “Let me explain!”

“Don’t bother, Jared,” said Jensen in a hard voice. “I’m going upstairs. I need to be with my sister.”

He turned on his heels and left. Jared didn’t stop him.

Jensen entered his sister’s room just as she opened her puffy eyes asking after him in a feeble croak. Her cheeks and forehead were burning and Jensen asked the maid to bring some warm gruel for her to drink in order to soften the irritation of her throat and some tepid water and a cloth to apply to her face in order to reduce the inflammation. After that, Jensen wrapped Mackenzie in his arms and began to tell her his favourite fairy-tales from childhood until her sniffles subsided and her breathing evened out.

He didn’t notice when his own tears began to fall.


	19. Chapter 19

In the silent, still, sombre days that followed, Jensen would often think back on his last encounter with his mother; on the last time he saw his mother alive. How tender was her look when she gazed upon him, how gentle was her touch when she placed her hand on his, how affectionate was the kiss that she left upon his cheek. To think that they had only just met after ten years apart! They were supposed to have years and years ahead of them…

Mackenzie had gradually quieted down into a mute sort of grief, stiff with glassy eyes staring into space, as though she had been put under a powerful hypnosis, the only sign of presence her hand that ever so often found Jensen’s, her tiny fingers curling around his with ferocity and force belied by their fragile appearance.

Jensen proceeded to go about his business in a manner more mechanical than natural, his many varied emotions in a state of enforced lockdown for the present. He wrote to Mrs Padalecki, telling her of the tragic news and asking her to take upon herself the preparations of his house for his and his sister’s arrival. He trusted her to make all the necessary arrangements.

Jared was a silent and – surprisingly – comforting presence even in the wake of his exposure. He was there, solid yet unobtrusive, supporting them in their grief, making sure that they didn’t miss meals, took regular walks and had everything that they needed, taking over writing letters and doing other things when Mackenzie wouldn’t let go off Jensen.

In due course, Mrs Padalecki’s letter, announcing that everything was ready to receive them at their home, arrived and the chosen day for their departure drew near. However, Jared remained oblique as to whether he was going to come with them or not and due to the fact that they rarely spoke these days Jensen knew nothing of his plans.

His composure and fortitude with which he had borne the terrible news of his mother’s death and the shock of Jared’s big secret shattered on the eve of the scheduled departure. Jared joined him in the drawing-room, whither Jensen descended after putting Mackenzie to bed, and informed him in a matter-of-fact manner that one word from Jensen would decide his fate and that he would leave him in peace and never disturb him again if that was what he wished.

Jensen heard the words and felt their effect with the force of a cannonball blasting through his chest and tearing his heart into million pieces, each bloody piece reverberating with pain so terrible it made him gasp for air. He shook his head and laughed. But it was not a happy laugh; it was loud and rasping and entirely devoid of mirth. Jensen doubled over and wrapped his arms around himself until he finally succumbed to his knees, his laughter turning to gut-wrenching sobs.

“Jensen!”

Jared fell to his knees beside him.

“You ruined my mother’s life,” gasped Jensen, poking Jared painfully in the chest. “You fatally injured my father. You lied to me. However, why not administer the final blow, right? Why not break my heart into the bargain and leave me with a wound that might never heal!”

Jared grabbed Jensen by the shoulders and glared fiercely at him.

“I will do anything you ask of me, Jensen. I swear! Just tell me what you want me to do. What do I have to do to be with you?”

Jensen looked balefully at him.

“Do you want to be with me?” he asked with a snort. “I thought I was merely another conquest, another casualty of your selfish desires.”

Jared shook his head.

“I have wanted you for myself from the moment I saw you again. I want us to be lifelong companions. I never lied to you about that, Jensen. I never lied to you about making mistakes.”

“Then don’t run away now,” whispered Jensen brokenly. “Kenzie needs a father. Don’t leave her. Don’t leave me…” he added after a pause.

Jared took Jensen’s hands in his, brought them to his mouth and kissed each knuckle with solemn reverence.

“Jensen… just… just think about it,” he said slowly. “I have caused you and your family so much pain, so much destruction, so much loss that I will never be able to atone for. How can you ever forgive me or stand to be with me after all that I’ve done? I am the least perfect person in the world. You shouldn’t want me. You shouldn’t want to be with me.”

Jensen sniffed.

“Jared, the problem is that it is not in my power not to want you. I can only imagine that if I could, I would have done so a long time ago. Besides, don’t they say that _absolute perfection is not attainable on earth_?” he asked, his eyes brimming with acquired wisdom.

“I beg to differ!” exclaimed Jared with fervor. “Whoever said that has never met you.”

Jensen stared incredulously at him before letting out a bark of laughter. “Flattery, Jared? Really?”

Jared nuzzled the palm of his hand like a giant cat and Jensen could have sworn that he had heard him purr as he said, “Anything to get into your good graces again, my love.”

Jensen rolled his eyes. “I expect my hands will be quite full from now on.”

“I am a handful,” agreed Jared, taking Jensen in his arms and wrapping his long limbs around him. “I thought you knew that already,” he added mischievously when their bodies met.

*

The three of them left the next day in Jared’s carriage. Mackenzie was gripping Jensen’s hand, half-excited, half-terrified. Jensen explained that he was taking her to her new home that she would be sharing with him and introduced Jared as his friend and neighbour. It had been decided between them that Jared would reveal his connection to her once she got settled in her new home and got used to her new life. It had also been decided that Jensen and Mackenzie would go directly to his house from whence after a few hours of repose they would pay a visit to his guardians. Jared, in the meantime, would proceed straight home to inform his parents that Jensen knew the truth about his sister’s parentage as well as to prepare them for the idea of becoming grandparents in the very near future.

The subsequent reunion was tearful and voluble. Jensen could not remain angry with his guardians for knowing the truth and concealing it from him and immediately silenced their apologies when they began to pour forth, mingled with more tears on Mrs Padaleck’s side and intense tobacco-sniffing on her husband’s. He swiftly introduced them to his sister and by telling her that they had brought him up as their own son instantly recommended them to her highest regard. Mackenzie at once became the centre of attention and Jensen had no doubt in his mind that she would be pampered and spoiled by her paternal grandparents to excess. However, he resolved to ensure that it didn’t turn her head by tempering their exuberance and putting certain precautions and restrictions in place for her to follow.

The appearance of Jensen’s half-sister created quite a stir in the neighbourhood and many and varied were the speculations that instantly began to circulate as to the identity of her father. However, that was a secret that was kept between those few belonging to the small family circle and it is safe to say that it never left its confines until the time was right for it to become public knowledge.

Jared appeared to take to heart his promise to his father given before his journey to London to take upon himself the responsibilities and the obligations of heir and landlord and began to go about his daily duties with determination and freshly awakened interest in land and timber that he would inherit one day. Under the pretext that he wished to spend more time with his daughter before telling her that he was her father, Jared moved to Jensen’s house, which was separated from his family estate only by a grove.

Gradually their life took on a steady course, but so replete with various tasks, chores, studies, amusements, visits, outings and explorations it was, that each coming day never failed to supply them with something new and exciting.

*

“I have just heard from father that Dr Pileggi has been offered a preferment and that he has already accepted it,” said Jared upon entering Jensen’s study one afternoon and sprawling himself on the couch from whence he proceeded to watch the younger man, who was presently writing a letter, with a look both tender and intense.

The moment the meaning of Jared’s words had sunk in, Jensen instantly fixed his attention upon him with the keenest interest. “Has he? But this is excellent news, Jared! I am just now writing a letter to Reverend Collins. He will be so pleased to hear it. I think he is growing rather forlorn and dispirited in London. I have been contemplating inviting him for a short stay in order to raise his spirits. Oh! I cannot wait for him to come and take the position that I know will bring him so much joy and gratification.”

Jared narrowed his eyes. “I cannot understand why you insist on writing to him every so often or liking him quite so much,” he grumbled like a spoilt child who didn’t want to share his toys with the others.

Jensen rolled his eyes (this was hardly the first time they’d had this particular conversation) and looked at him with fond exasperation that he so often wore around him these days. He sometimes thought that out of the two of them he was the older and the more mature one.

“Jared,” he said sternly, having discovered that if he pitched his voice lower and looked gravely at him, it would have a desired effect on the other man, “Reverend Collins is my friend and I happen to enjoy corresponding with him. I dare say you would like him too if you hadn’t gotten it into your head that you should be jealous of him. I keep telling you that there are no grounds for that. He is a very good sort of man and an excellent minister but he is not like us.”

“A twelvemonth ago you would not say that you were,” pointed out Jared.

Jensen smiled slightly. “I’m afraid a twelvemonth ago I barely knew myself or what I was capable was.” His eyes acquired a reminiscent glint. “I had set up an impossibly high goal before a naïve young man I hadn’t taken the trouble of getting to know well beforehand.”

“Well,” drawled Jared, “now that you know what you are capable of, why don’t you join me on this particularly sturdy leather couch and demonstrate what you have learnt under my expert tutelage?”

He patted the spot beside him. Jensen shook his head and glanced swiftly at the door to indicate that someone could walk in on them.

“Miss Day has taken Mackenzie outside to paint the woods about the estate,” said Jared. “I have seen them myself as I made my way towards the house, merrily walking with their drawing things towards the grove. They will not be back for an hour at least.”

He beckoned Jensen towards him.

“I have been out all morning, dealing with disgruntled farmers and obnoxious tenants. I am sure I deserve some pampering for tolerating their complaints, demands and insolence with such perfect forbearance as I have displayed, graciously promising to see what could be done about their various grievances, instead of raising their rent or getting rid of the lot.”

Jensen snorted. “Jared, just let me finish the letter,” he said.

“Well, I suppose there is one good thing at least about your Reverend Collins coming here – no more pesky letters to him to detain you!”


	20. Chapter 20

Having a houseful of servants and a young child into the bargain meant that they had no opportunity to resume their more intimate activities upon their return to the country. Both men keenly felt the distance and the separation and thought wistfully and longingly of their living arrangements in town that provided them with unrestricted liberty to do as they pleased, at least until their idyll had been interrupted by an unwanted guest from the past. But even then it didn’t seem like such a hopeless case. These days they could barely count on rare stolen moments of hasty embraces, sneaky touches and timid kisses, for they were inevitably ruined by the necessity to look over one’s shoulder or listen carefully for the sound of approaching footsteps.

Jensen was particularly jittery and trembled with fear rather than pleasure whenever Jared held him in his arms, which could not but provoke Jared’s extreme irritation, for he felt that he was rapidly losing ground he had so painstakingly gained. In his turn, Jensen felt guilt-ridden and eager to please Jared after every encounter cut abruptly short by his fear of being discovered, especially when it became obvious that he had imagined the danger in the first place. He would then proceed to restore Jared’s spirits by kissing him thoroughly and fearlessly on the mouth, tugging fistfuls of Jared’s long hair out of their silk ribbon and grasping them in his hands. He had also discovered that looking coyly from under his long eyelashes and calling Jared “my lord and master” always did the trick.

Presently, Jensen added a postscript with the highly anticipated tidings about the living that was soon to be vacant, concluded the letter with “your most affectionate and humble servant”, sealed it with the signet ring that belonged to his father, locked the door to the study and finally approached Jared, having added an entirely exaggerated tilt to his hips.

“Mr Padalecki,” he said softly, standing demurely in front of him. “How may I unburden the cares weighing so heavily upon your broad shoulders?”

Jared sat up on the couch and patted his thighs invitingly. Jensen took the hint and instantly straddled Jared’s lap, his bowlegs spreading easily to accommodate his girth. He shamelessly sprawled on top of Jared, wound his arms around his neck and began to grind against him in a very wanton fashion.

“I’m afraid you have been exposed to some very bad school while in town. I declare you act like a harlot,” said Jared.

“I was under the impression that you preferred them easy and available,” remarked Jensen dryly.

Jared put on an expression of wide-eyed disbelief.

“I believe as any sportsman worthy of his name I enjoy a good challenge,” he replied indignantly. “I knew you would prove to be such one.”

“A good challenge?” repeated Jensen before snorting and shaking his head. “Jared, how can you even say that? I fell for all your tricks faster than a winged bird falls to the ground!”

Jared laughed and drew him into a leisurely kiss, grabbing his buttocks and bringing their bodies closer still.

Later – much later – Jensen leaned his head on Jared’s shoulder and sighed in utter bliss, playing absent-mindedly with Jared’s hair at the nape of his neck.

“ _In some cases the strong fortress of the heart is demolished by violent assault, and in other cases it is taken by gentle and often repeated attacks_ ,” he quoted. “Perhaps, in our case it was a bit of both.”

“I do not think that I can spend so many nights alone in my bed,” muttered Jared, greedily running his hands all over Jensen. “I cannot bear the thought of being in the next room with you, unable to sneak into your bed, strip you naked and ravish you silly.”

Jensen nodded into his neck. “I know, Jared. I know,” he whispered in a subdued voice. “But what can be done? We simply cannot risk exposure. It would ruin everything.”

“I have been doing some thinking,” continued Jared slowly. “Of course, it is neither a perfect nor a permanent solution, but should we choose to implement it, I believe it will provide us with some time at the very least to spend solely in each other’s company.”

Jensen raised his head and looked curiously at him. “What do you have in mind?”

“I’m sure that my parents would not at all mind taking Mackenzie for a day or two every now and then,” said Jared. “As for the servants – well – they work so hard, don’t they? I’m sure they deserve a short holiday as well.”

Jensen smiled. “I’m sure they do,” he said and kissed Jared on the cheek. “I’m likewise sure that your parents can’t wait to get me out of the way so that they can spoil Kenzie rotten.”

“Do you approve then?”

“Did you think I would not?”

Jared smirked. “I do believe you were right before. You are easy,” he teased, nipping Jensen’s plush bottom lip.

Jensen grinned. “I believe the fault is entirely yours.”

“In this case, I am ready to take full responsibility for my actions,” replied Jared proudly and took Jensen’s beckoning mouth for another passionate kiss.

*

Jensen checked the temperature of the water in the tub and pursed his lips. It had been quite hot when the servant had drawn it before taking his leave along with everyone else, but if Jared didn’t make haste, it would soon grow too cold for them to enjoy.

Jensen jumped when the door to his room opened and Jared entered with a holler that one usually emitted upon catching sight of a hare during a hunt.

“Have you checked the gates?” asked Jensen, appearing from behind the screen, looking wide-eyed and pallid.

Jared nodded.

“And the front doors?”

Jared nodded again.

“And the windows?” Jensen could feel cold sweat breaking out on the back of his neck. “Jared, what if a window was left open somewhere? I know that some of the maids can be pretty careless. What if someone breaks in?”

Jared shook his head and took Jensen in his arms. “Everything is locked and secured,” he said calmly. “Do not worry.”

Jensen gnawed on his bottom lip. “So there is no one in the house but the two of us?”

“Not a single living soul.”

“But how can we be certain unless we conduct a thorough search of the place?” Jensen put his hands on Jared’s chest and met his gaze, his own eyes pleading. “Jared, I don’t think this is such a good idea after all.”

Jared took a deep breath and shook his head. “Jensen, you must calm down before you drive yourself to utter distraction with worry. No one is going to enter through the gates or break in through the front doors or sneak in through the windows. I have checked and double checked everything on my way here. I swear. Now undress and get into the tub before it turns to ice.”

Jared stepped back and slapped Jensen lightly on his thigh. Berating himself for being so nervous and downright paranoid, Jensen began to undress, his hands fumbling terribly with the many items of his clothing in his current state of mingled agitation and anticipation. From the corner of his eye he noticed that Jared stood quite still, with his back to the screen, his arms crossed on his chest.

At Jensen’s inquiring look he smirked.

“Don’t mind me. I am merely enjoying the view.”

Jensen blushed, though he was certain that it would escape Jared’s notice in the dim candle-light that Jensen had insisted upon. However, his indignant spluttering was loud enough to hear.

Jared chuckled.

“I do not remember the last time I saw you unclothed, sweetheart. Surely you are not so cold-hearted as to deny a starving man the sight of your naked flesh. It is particularly – ah – arousing.”

Jensen shook his head and proceeded to undress himself even more self-consciously now that he was aware of Jared’s heated scrutiny. His skin appeared to be covered with a thin sheen of perspiration by the time he had folded his garments and undergarments and put them aside.

He started and shivered when Jared wrapped his arms around him before bringing him flush with his fully-clothed body, his hands cupping his buttocks and squeezing. Jensen let out a strangled cry of surprise and began to untie Jared’s neck-cloth without meeting his eye, concentrating with all his might on keeping his breathing and heartbeat steady, feeling extremely vulnerable yet excited as his hardening cock rubbed against Jared’s buckskin breeches. He tried to be swift and efficient as he undressed Jared, mindful of the water getting colder the longer they took to get into the tub.

It was a shock when their naked bodies finally came into contact after such a long time apart, producing loud gasps and moans of pleasure from both of them. For a while they simply stood there, completely wrapped in each other, soaking in that singularly extraordinary feeling of bare skin on skin, the touch of their palms and intertwined fingers, the press of their lips, the dance of their tongues, the bite of their teeth.

The water was rather lukewarm by the time they climbed into the tub but their bodies were so feverish they appeared not to notice. They washed each other slowly, tenderly, thoroughly. There was no hurry. Jensen had finally relaxed, lying on top of Jared, cradled by his strong arms and long legs. He felt comfortable, secure. He didn’t want to move, which is why he grumbled his displeasure when Jared nudged him to get up once his teeth started chattering.

Jensen reluctantly climbed out, hastily dried himself and whisked across the room before crawling under the covers. Jared prodded the fire in the grate and joined him, now positioning himself on top of Jensen. They began to rub lazily against each other, their mouths once again locked in a frenzied battle of tongues and teeth. Jensen lifted his legs and wrapped them tightly around Jared’s back when their bodies began to rut fiercely of their own accord.

“Jensen...”

Jared rose on his haunches and brought Jensen along with him so that he was now sitting on his lap, his legs wrapped securely around Jared.

“What... what is it?” asked Jensen in a daze, trying to focus his gaze on Jared through the fog of sensual pleasure surrounding him.

“I… ” Jared cleared his throat. “Jensen… will you… will you let me have you?” he asked in the end, his voice a low rumble.

Jensen’s eyes widened but he nodded.

He didn’t realize that he had started trembling until Jared began to croon soothingly into his ear, hushing his fears with endearments and encouragements, while gently rocking him against his chest. Jensen buried his head in the crook of Jared’s neck, breathing deeply, Jared’s scent like a calming draught.

He did not hesitate or resist when Jared guided him to lie on his back again, running his hands up and down his thighs, making his muscles relax, coaxing his legs to fall apart. He had been putting so much mental effort into dispelling the terror that had overcome him at the thought of finally giving himself completely to Jared that he had failed to notice how hard he had become at the same time. His cock was jutting upwards like a mast, proudly presenting itself to Jared.

“Beautiful,” murmured Jared, moving his palm up and down the shaft, stroking and teasing the tip of his finger against the slit.

Jensen fisted the sheet beneath him and arched his back, breathing loudly.

Jared placed the palm of his other hand against his abdomen. “Lift up, sweetheart,” he said. “Press your legs against your chest.”

Jensen flushed deeply; embarrassed by the fact that he would be thus exposing himself. Jared released his cock and grasped his chin then, smirking when Jensen had no other choice but to meet his eye.

“Come now, love, don’t be coy,” he chided playfully, sliding his hands beneath Jensen’s thighs and working his palms against their underside in order to disperse the tension. “I wish to see that fine rear of yours. I have greatly missed the sight.”

Jensen swallowed and lifted his legs, pressing them to his chest, wide-eyed. Jared moistened his finger and trailed it slowly from Jensen’s balls to his tiny, puckered hole, pressing it gently inside. Jensen gasped and began to tremble again.

“Does it hurt?”

Jensen shook his head. Jared pushed further in, past the tense circle of muscles.

“I will need to stretch and prepare you before we proceed,” continued Jared softly, his finger inching deeper and deeper as he spoke.

“How do you mean?” croaked Jensen, his throat parched and his palms sweaty.

Jared took Jensen’s hand and wrapped it around his own cock, his finger still inside Jensen’s hole, twisting and turning and sending sparks of pleasure through him.

“I am going to fuck you, Jensen. Do you know what that means?”

Jensen stared apprehensively at Jared’s huge cock and nodded.

“That’s right. I’m going to put my dick right into that sweet hole of yours. It will be a tight fit, I grant you that. I do not wish to hurt you.”

Jensen’s eyes had grown even bigger. “I don’t think it will fit, Jared,” he said, shaking his head. “It is too big.”

Jared smirked. “I am pleased you think so. You are pretty well endowed yourself.”

“Except I don’t have to impale myself on my own cock,” pointed out Jensen, trying to disguise his fear with an air of irritation.

Jared laughed. He moved off the bed and a few moments later began to rummage in the pocket of his coat, leaving Jensen with a mouthful of saliva at the enticing sight of his broad shoulders, muscular back, well-shaped backside and strong legs finely reflected in the copper glow of the candle-light. Upon his return he was twirling a small twinkling glass jar in his fingers.

“I do not approve of using spit to facilitate penetration and this excellent concoction will render the experience both pleasurable and sweet-smelling.”

Jensen watched as Jared unstoppered the jar and scooped the concoction onto his fingers, rubbing them together. Jensen caught a whiff of roses. Jared put away the jar and pressed the finger back into Jensen’s twitching hole. It was slightly cold this time around, making Jensen squirm away. Jared held him in place as he began to massage the entrance before adding another finger.

Jensen gasped and jerked his hips at the same time as his cock began to drip. Jared’s fingers slipped easily inside now, filling him nicely yet leaving room for more. He added a third finger then and Jensen put his legs, bent at the knees, on the bed and began to move closer, shamelessly trying to get the slick fingers deeper inside of him without realizing what he was doing or how he looked.

Jared hissed at the sight. “I think you’re ready.” His fingers withdrew.

Jensen whined. Jared chuckled. “Patience, my love.”

He scooped some more of that rose-smelling stuff onto his fingers and began to lube his cock. Jensen watched him greedily, his hips arching and dancing, his own cock bobbing and glistening.

Jared took Jensen by the ankles, leaned over, kissed the tip of his cock and pressed his legs back to his chest before aligning his cock with Jensen’s hole and pressing the head inside.

He pushed in.

Jensen’s eyes bulged and he cursed – out loud – for the very first time in his life.

Jared threw his head back and guffawed. He was pushing slowly in, past the ring of terrified muscles, spreading Jensen’s hole with his fingers, his enormous cock gradually disappearing inside. Jensen was caught between being petrified and unable to move one minute and vibrating and thrashing the next. Then, when Jared was buried fully within him, he stopped, breathing heavily, drops of sweat rolling down his face, neck and chest, his arms trembling as they grasped Jensen’s bent legs. Jensen didn’t think he could breathe so full he felt.

Experimentally, he clenched his hole around Jared’s cock. Jared cursed and began to move. Jensen’s eyes rolled backwards. His hands were flailing and his fingers were scraping along the sheet. He was sure there would be deep scratch marks later. His abdomen was twitching, his muscles contracting, his insides were throbbing with desire that was growing stronger and stronger; his hole was greedily clenching and unclenching around Jared’s cock, making him curse and still for a split second once again, closing his eyes and drawing a deep breath, before resuming his pace.

Then something happened – a surge of pleasure so powerful he had never felt the like of it before. It was as though Jared had touched something within him that had intensified every single sensation to such a degree that he began to see golden spots exploding in front of his eyes. The pleasure was rolling over him in waves of heat and sweat, erupting through him in electrified bursts and keen screams as Jared hit the same spot again and again and again; a rushing, ringing sound filled his ears, growing louder, higher – until his release tore through him like a cannonball and he spilled all over his chest and neck, stray droplets landing on his face.

He was panting and staring at the dark canopy of his four-poster in a white haze; his heart was pounding loudly in his ears, his body was vibrating with tremors, his legs were pressed tightly to his chest as Jared continued to pound into him at a constantly increasing pace, his rhythm becoming erratic, his movements changing and turning to short, jabbing motions as he began to shake around him.

Jensen felt as though his mind had exploded in a most spectacular way and he had trouble gathering the pieces together. He was at least half-delirious, it seemed, as he blinked the haze away and concentrated on that strange and unlike any sensation of being filled. It became even more bizarre when he felt spurts of Jared’s release. Jared began to convulse and blindly sink his fingers and teeth into Jensen’s flesh as he spilled his load within Jensen’s welcoming hole.

Jared stilled when there was apparently nothing left to spill and began to withdraw, slowly, almost teasingly, smearing Jensen’s buttocks with the sticky tip of his cock as he did so.

Jensen was too blissfully languid to do anything other than widen his eyes in mild surprise and yelp when he felt Jared lick and lap up his own come out of Jensen’s hole, thrusting his tongue and swirling it inside as though it was the most natural thing in the world.

Having licked Jensen clean, Jared rolled over onto his back, panting and grinning, looking extremely pleased with himself, his mouth glistening obscenely in the candle-light. And though he was feeling too limp and heavy to move, Jensen turned to his side and curiously pressed his lips to Jared’s, trembling with an effort of holding himself up on one elbow as he tasted what surely must be equaled to a forbidden fruit.

He was instantly distracted by Jared’s tongue thrusting into his mouth as eagerly as it had thrust into his hole a few moments before. The thought should have disgusted him but it did not.

“I never thought it could be like that,” he admitted, falling back onto his back, his voice hoarse, his limbs spread out; exhausted, sated, happy…

“Have been thinking much about it?” asked Jared smugly, turning over so that he was half-lying on top of Jensen, pressing wet kisses into his quivering stomach, lazily tracing his hipbones with his tongue.

“Perhaps,” replied Jensen, grinning and squirming, one of his hands playing with Jared’s hair.

“I dare say I’d like to hear more.”

“I dare say I might just oblige you.”

Jared began to leave licks and nips across Jensen’s lower abdomen. “I am all attention,” he mumbled, choosing a particularly sensitive spot and sucking on it.

Jensen arched and moaned and stretched himself out as wantonly and unabashedly as a cat, no longer blushing at or embarrassed by his nakedness it seemed.

“I might have brought myself to release on several occasions just thinking about what it would be like… with you… in me…” he said contentedly.

“Have you now?” murmured Jared. “Have you used your fingers on those occasions, by any chance?”

Jensen giggled. He was feeling giddy and punch-drunk. “I might have.”

“Will you show me?”

Jensen wriggled his hips. “I should think so.”

Jared lifted his head and stared curiously at him. “Well, who would have thought that all one had to do in order to rid you of your inhibitions was to give you a thorough fucking!”

Jensen laughed and gave Jared a very fond look. He was so happy and relaxed he didn’t even bat an eyelid when Jared informed him matter-of-factly that neither of them would be wearing any clothes the next day.

“As you wish,” he mumbled sweetly before yawning widely.

He tugged Jared upwards, and when he was facing him, curled into his large and hot as a furnace body, smiling and sighing blissfully as he drifted off to sleep, wrapped in Jared’s arms.

FINIS

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Tempting Jensen art post](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14986484) by [winchestergirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/winchestergirl/pseuds/winchestergirl)




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